Pupil Premium Strategy

What is the Pupil Premium?

Introduced in 2011, the pupil premium is a sum of money given to schools each year by the Government to improve the attainment of disadvantaged children.  This is based on research showing that children from low income families perform less well at school than their peers. Often, children who are entitled to pupil premium face challenges such as poor language and communication skills, less family support, lack of confidence and issues with attendance and punctuality. The pupil premium is intended to directly benefit the children who are eligible by helping to narrow the gap between them and their classmates.

Schools are given a pupil premium for:

• Children who have qualified for free school meals at any point in the past six years. The school receives £1455 for each of these children.
• Children who have been looked after under local authority care for more than one day. These children are awarded a premium of £2530.
• Children in year groups reception to year 11 recorded as Ever 6 service child or in receipt of a child pension from the Ministry of Defence.

How is it spent?

Schools can choose how to spend their pupil premium money, as the government believe they are best placed to identify what would be of most benefit to the children who are eligible.  Often, all of the children in the school will reap some benefit from how the school spends its pupil premium: for example, often the money is used to fund teaching assistants who work across a group of classes, rather than providing one-to-one support.

Can parents influence how the Pupil Premium is used?

There is no obligation for schools to consult with parents about how they use the money they claim for each child.  However, schools do have to show that they are using their pupil premium fund appropriately. This is measured through Ofsted inspections and annual performance tables showing the progress made by children who are eligible for pupil premium.

At Hillcross, we publish details online, including how much money we have been allocated, how we intend to spend it, how we spent the previous year’s allocation and how it made a difference to the attainment of disadvantaged pupils.  This can be found by clicking on the Pupil Premium Strategy document below.

How to claim your child’s Pupil Premium

Your child may be eligible for free school meals – and accordingly, pupil premium – if you receive any of the following benefits:

• Income support
• Income-based jobseekers’ allowance
• Income-related employment and support allowance
• Support under Part IV of the Immigration and Asylum Act 1999
• The guaranteed element of state pension credit
• Child tax credit, provided that you are also not entitled to working tax credit and have an annual gross income of £16,190 or less
• Universal credit

To find out if you are eligible for Free School Meals / Pupil Premium please click on the link below:

Is my child eligible for PPI funding?

If you are unable to access the online application form, we keep a very limited number of paper copies in the school office.

The local authority will inform you directly of the outcome and will contact the school on your behalf. If you wish them to, your child/ren will be able to have a free school meal from the date of eligibility, but you must let the school know in advance if you wish to take up this option. 

From September 2023, all children in primary schools receive free school meals, regardless of their family income, but only the children who would have qualified for free meals under the above income-based criteria will receive the pupil premium.