Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment his Department has made of the potential merits of providing schools with the flexibility to decide on how to manage their summer school programmes in order to ensure that programmes take into account the specific needs of their pupils in response to the covid-19 outbreak.

£200 million will be made available to secondary schools to deliver face-to-face summer schools. Schools will have the flexibility to plan a summer programme that best meets the needs of the school and its pupils. The Department will be publishing guidance for schools shortly.

Although schools are free to involve other pupils where the school has identified a particular need, the Department expects that most will want to focus summer schools on pupils making the transition into Year 7.

The aim of the programme, drawing on the evidence of good practice, is to deliver a summer school that offers a blend of academic education and enrichment activities, but the specific design will be for schools to decide.