Question to the Department for Education:

To ask Her Majesty’s Government what consideration they have given to extending the measure of disadvantage for school pupils to include factors beyond eligibility for free school meals and the Pupil Premium.

The Government currently defines the term ‘disadvantaged pupil’ in national statistics to be those pupils known to be eligible for free school meals at any point in the last 6 years or children looked after for six months or more. These are the pupils who attract pupil premium funding.

From April 2014, eligibility for the pupil premium was extended to all looked after children, and to children who have left care through adoption, special guardianship orders or child arrangements orders. The Government is considering widening the national statistics definition of “disadvantaged pupil” to this group for the publication of test and examination results from 2015.

We recognise that educational disadvantage extends beyond eligibility for free school meals and the pupil premium. This is why the Government has given local authorities the discretion to allocate dedicated schools grant funding for pupils with low prior attainment and pupils for whom English is not their first language. In addition, local authorities can choose to allocate funding through an area-based measure of deprivation, either alongside or instead of free school meals eligibility.

In considering future measures of disadvantage, the Department for Education commissioned RAND and the University of Cambridge to undertake a study to examine whether indicators other than free school meal eligibility may be used to identify which pupils are likely to underachieve. The report will be published soon.