Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what steps she is taking to ensure children in foster care are sufficiently supported in the mainstream education system.

Every local authority in England must appoint a Virtual School Head to promote the educational attainment of the children they look after, including children in foster care, wherever they live or are educated. All schools must also appoint a designated teacher with expertise in the needs of looked-after children. These children attract pupil premium plus funding of £2,630 per child up to the age of 16, managed by the Virtual School Head, to support meeting objectives in each child’s individual Personal Education Plan. We also provide post‑16 funding to help young people progress into further and higher education, training or employment. The full offer for children in care is set out in in the ‘Promoting the education of looked-after and previously looked-after children’ statutory guidance, available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/promoting-the-education-of-looked-after-children.

Through the Children’s Wellbeing and Schools Bill, we are extending the Virtual School Head’s duties to include promoting the educational achievement of all children with a social worker and children in kinship care.