Covid Catch up Premium

What is Covid grant funding?

Children and young people across the country have experienced unprecedented disruption to their education as a result of coronavirus. The government announced £1 billion of funding to support children and young people to catch up.  Although all children have had their education disrupted by the coronavirus outbreak, we know that it is likely that disadvantaged and vulnerable groups will have been affected most. Alongside the universal catch-up premium, the government are launching a £350 million National Tutoring Programme to provide additional, targeted support for those children and young people who need it. Schools’ allocations will be calculated on a per pupil basis, providing each mainstream school with a total of £80 for each pupil in years reception through to 11. As the catch-up grant has been designed to mitigate the effects of the unique disruption caused by coronavirus.

Use of funds

At St Vincent’s we will use this funding for specific activities to support our pupils to catch up for lost teaching over the previous months, in line with the guidance on curriculum expectations for the next academic year. We know that we have the flexibility to spend their funding in the best way for their cohort and circumstances. In order to make the  best use of this funding, we have used the information and guidance from the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF)  a coronavirus (COVID-19) support guide for schools with evidence-based approaches to catch up for all pupils. We have used this document to help spend the funding in the most effective way.  Total covid catch up funding: £50,400 for one year. 

Focus of Covid Catch Up Funding allocated

The aim of our Covid Catch Up funding at St. Vincent’s Catholic Primary School is to address the learning loss of children as a result of Covid.  We do this by ensuring that the funding is strategically and effectively targeted to address lost learning. When identifying strategies and allocating funding to particular projects, we consider the impact of previous experience within our school context, as well as applying knowledge gained from external research including the Educational Endowment Foundation and the Sutton Trust. We are committed to using a range of measures to evaluate the impact of the funding as an ongoing process throughout each academic year. The focus for us will be on mitigating the learning loss for all with a particular focus on disadvantaged pupils following Covid 19 and supporting wellbeing.  The impact of spending is monitored via the senior leadership team, phase leaders and subject leaders and is presented and monitored by the covid and finance committee. Please find the full Covid catch up grant plan here.