Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how many people in post-16 education are currently working towards (a) level two, (b) level three, (c) level four and (d) level five qualifications.
Answered by Anne Milton
The attached table shows the official participation estimates and highest qualification aims for 16 to 18 year olds in full and part-time education in England for the latest 5 years.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what information his Department holds on the proportion of students granted a place at (a) Russell Group, (b) University Alliance, (c) Million Plus and (d) Guild HE universities having obtained three D grades or lower at A-level in each of the last three years.
Answered by Chris Skidmore
The Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) publish data on the number of English 18 year-olds accepted into full-time higher education (HE) by A level points score.
The table below shows the number of 18 year-olds in England who held at least three A levels and were accepted into HE with A level points equivalent to DDD or below:
Year | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 |
Acceptances | 6,605 | 7,095 | 7,505 |
These figures are not published at an institution level.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what information his Department holds on the number of students who have been granted a university place after obtaining three D grades or lower at A-level in each of the last three years.
Answered by Chris Skidmore
The Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) publish data on the number of English 18 year-olds accepted into full-time higher education (HE) by A level points score.
The table below shows the number of 18 year-olds in England who held at least three A levels and were accepted into HE with A level points equivalent to DDD or below:
Year | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 |
Acceptances | 6,605 | 7,095 | 7,505 |
These figures are not published at an institution level.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of students study (a) law, (b) medicine, (c) engineering, (d) social sciences at university after obtaining 3 D's or lower at A-level.
Answered by Chris Skidmore
The Higher Education Statistics Agency publishes data on the number of entrants to full-time first degree courses by subject and qualifications held on entry in Table WP2 of the ‘Widening participation: UK Performance Indicators 2016/17’, which is published at the following link: https://www.hesa.ac.uk/news/01-02-2018/widening-participation-tables.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what additional financial support his Department makes available to (a) primary and (b) secondary schools with high numbers of SEND children.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Local authorities are required to provide schools with sufficient funds to enable them to provide additional support up to the value of £6,000 for pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND). This is provided through the local school formula. When the costs of supporting an individual pupil are more than £6,000 per year, the local authority provides top-up funding from its high needs budget. It is for the local authority to determine what level of top-up funding is required for each pupil.
In addition, local authorities have the discretion to give schools additional funding from the high needs budget, for example to support schools which are particularly inclusive of pupils with SEND. Authorities in England are planning to provide £41 million to primary schools and £16 million to secondary schools in such funding, in addition to the funding provided through their local formula and through top-ups.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, how much funding his Department has allocated to Southampton City Council to support children with SEND needs in each of the last eight years.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
Local authorities are legally required to provide schools with sufficient funds to enable schools to meet the additional cost of pupils with special educational needs and disabilities (SEND), up to £6,000 per annum per pupil. Within their local schools formula, local authorities use factors such as low prior attainment and free school meals to do this. This funding is provided from the local authority’s schools budget.
When the costs of additional support required for a pupil with SEN exceed £6,000, the authority should also allocate additional top-up funding to cover the excess costs. In addition, the local authority pays the full costs for all children who are placed in special schools. This funding comes from the authority’s high needs budget.
The department has allocated funding in separate blocks for schools and high needs since 2013-14. Southampton’s allocations for each of these years are shown below. These were taken from the dedicated schools grant allocations for each year. Allocations for 2018-19 can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dedicated-schools-grant-dsg-2018-to-2019.
Year | Schools Block (in millions) | High Needs Block (in millions) |
2013-14 | £125.0 | £17.1 |
2014-15 | £126.9 | £18.1 |
2015-16 | £130.4 | £18.4 |
2016-17 | £135.3 | £18.9 |
2017-18 | £136.1 | £22.6 |
2018-19 | £139.0 | £23.3 |
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what financial support is available to schools from local authorities to support SEND children.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
A mainstream school’s funding is calculated through a local funding formula decided by the local authority in consultation with its schools. Local authorities are required to provide schools with sufficient funds to enable schools to meet the additional cost of pupils with special educational needs (SEN) and disabilities, up to £6,000. The local formula often uses factors such as low prior attainment and free school meals to do this. The local authority can also give additional funding from its high needs budget to schools that have a disproportionate number of pupils with SEN whose additional support costs up to £6,000.
When the costs of additional support required for a pupil with SEN exceed £6,000, the local authority should allocate additional top-up funding to cover the excess costs. This funding comes from the local authority’s high needs budget. The local authorities’ high needs funding allocation also covers the costs of provision in special schools, and alternative provision. Nationally, high needs funding has risen from a total of £5 billion in 2013 to just under £6 billion this year. Allocations to individual local authorities for this year can be found at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/dedicated-schools-grant-dsg-2018-to-2019.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what the staffing budget for schools has been in each of the last five years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The Department does not allocate funding specifically for staffing. Schools are best placed to make decisions about how to use their funding to deliver the best outcomes for their pupils.
The total funding allocated through the schools block of the dedicated schools grant in each of the last five years is shown below:
Year | Dedicated schools grant, |
2014-15 | £30,655 |
2015-16 | £32,168 |
2016-17 | £32,650 |
2017-18 | £33,094 |
2018-19 | £33,684[1] |
[1] This figure is not directly comparable to previous years as the central schools services block was introduced in 2018-19. Prior to 2018-19, much of that funding was provided through the schools block. Re-baselining was carried out in this year due to the introduction of the national funding formula, which led to some funding movements between blocks.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment his Department made on potential merits of including sailing on the national curriculum for Physical Education.
Answered by Nadhim Zahawi
The national curriculum sets out the aspects of physical education that should be taught to pupils. It does not stipulate that particular sports should be taught.
The department published subject content for reformed physical education GCSE, AS and A levels in England in January 2015. Both sets of subject content include a list of activities in which students can be assessed. On 24 October 2018, the department launched a review inviting proposals to add activities to the list. This review can be accessed at: https://consult.education.gov.uk/gcse-and-alevel-reform/review-of-gcse-as-and-a-level-physical-education-a/.
The deadline for responses is 20 December 2018.
Asked by: Royston Smith (Conservative - Southampton, Itchen)
Question to the Department for Education:
To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what information his Department holds on the number of pupils (a) entitled to and (b) not entitled to free school meals who achieved (i) AAA, (ii) AAB and (iii) ABB grades at A-level in the last five years.
Answered by Nick Gibb
The number of students, at the end of Key Stage 5, achieving A*-B grades in A levels, split by Free School Meal status, is provided in the attached table.