Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government whether the pupil premium has enabled more children from very low income households to take part in activities such as residential fieldwork courses and museum visits.

The independent evaluation report ‘Evaluation of pupil premium’[1] and the Ofsted report ‘The pupil premium: how schools are spending the funding successfully to maximise achievement’[2], both published in 2013, state that residential fieldwork and museum visits are amongst the activities on which some schools chose to spend this funding.

Schools are free to spend the pupil premium as they see fit in deciding how to raise the attainment of disadvantaged pupils. They are strongly encouraged, however, to consider the evidence of what works and are required to publish online how they have used this funding and the impact it has had. They are also held to account for the progress and attainment of those pupils through Ofsted inspections and measures in the performance tables.

[1] www.gov.uk/government/publications/evaluation-of-pupil-premium

[2] www.ofsted.gov.uk/resources/pupil-premium-how-schools-are-spending-funding-successfully-maximise-achievement