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Pupil Premium

Pupil Premium strategy statement

This statement details our school’s use of Pupil Premium (and recovery premium for the 2023 to 2024 academic year) funding to help improve the attainment of our disadvantaged pupils.

It outlines our Pupil Premium strategy, how we intend to spend the funding in this academic year and the effect that last year’s spending of Pupil Premium had within our school.

School overview
 

Detail Data
School name Sutton Coldfield Grammar School for Girls
Number of pupils in school 1207 (Yr7-11 899)
Proportion (%) of Pupil Premium eligible pupils 11.2%
Academic year/years that our current Pupil Premium strategy plan covers (3 year plans are recommended)

2021/22 to

2024/25
Date this statement was published December 2023
Date on which it will be reviewed September 2024
Statement authorised by Barbara Minards, Headteacher
Pupil Premium lead Samantha Hart,
Assistant Headteacher
Governor / Trustee lead Matt Jeavons

Funding overview
 

Detail Amount
Pupil Premium funding allocation this academic year £101,188
Recovery premium funding allocation this academic year £26,494
Pupil Premium funding carried forward from previous years
(enter £0 if not applicable)
£0
Total budget for this academic year
If your school is an academy in a trust that pools this funding, state the amount available to your school this academic year

£127,682

Part A: Pupil Premium strategy plan

Statement of intent
 

We believe that all students will benefit from a continued whole school focus on excellent teaching and learning, personal development and wellbeing. In addition to the whole school approaches, we will identify a number of specific interventions to focus on. 

The school will build on its use of the PPG (the Pupil Premium Grant provides additional funding that publicly funded schools in England use to support disadvantaged pupils) by continuing to provide targeted strategies to promote achievement. The school's approach is informed by the 'Teaching and Learning Toolkit' from the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF), an independent resource which provides guidance for teachers and schools on how to use their resources to improve the attainment of disadvantaged students. The school will also seek to develop students digital learning skills in line with the future workplace requirements.  Further to this we are intending to build relationships with families to gain a better insight to challenges that students may face.

Setting priorities is key to maximising impact and our priorities are as follows: 

  • Ensuring the highest quality of education is delivered to all students.  
  • Ensuring that all students have access to digital technology to support their learning.
  • Closing the attainment gap between disadvantaged students and their peers.
  • Providing targeted academic support for students who are not making the expected progress. 
  • Ensuring that all students have full access to extra-curricular and enrichment opportunities. 
  • Addressing barriers to attainment such as examination skills and subject resources.

In our research and planning, we have analysed attendance, SEND and Sleuth (rewards) data and identified that there is no statistically significant gap in any of these fields. This is a clear strength of our provision of pastoral support to all students, but we will continue monitoring throughout the year and will respond to any gaps, should any arise.

Challenges

This details the key challenges to achievement that we have identified among our disadvantaged pupils.

Challenge Number Detail of challenge
1.

The GCSE 2023 data demonstrates no significant attainment gap in achievement. The Progress 8 score was 1.36 for pupil premium students versus 0.90 for non-pupil premium students.  In Maths pupil premium students scored 2.85 compared to non-pupil premium students scoring 1.86, and this was seen in English as well with 2.21 versus 1.52. Outside of the Progress8 score and analysing the average grade in each of the 19 GCSE subjects available, pupil premium students attained higher than non-pupil premium students in Business Studies, Chemistry, Design Technology, Drama, English Language and Literature, Food and Nutrition, Mathematics, Music and Physics and in line with non-pupil premium students in History, Religious Studies, Biology, Geography, Physical Education and Spanish. In French, Art and Computer Science. Pupil premium students averaged 7.6 compared to non-pupil premium students averaging 8.0 in French, in Art this was 7.7 compared to 8.2 and in computer Science 6.7 compared to 7.3. These three differences are all within one grade of non-pupil premium students.

We will continue to conduct further analysis to investigate at a subject level by using mock examination data for current Year 11 students when this is available.
2. From conversations and student surveys, we will identify any GCSE students who do not have access to a digital device for learning. Further to this, we will liaise with students and staff to identify digital skills which are required and any gaps which exist.
3.

Our safeguarding data shows that disadvantaged students have identified social, emotional and mental health issues, such as anxiety and self-harm. This is particularly driven by academic pressures due to the partial school closures from COVID-19.

The 21-22 data showed that 59% of pupil premium students have had a safeguarding concern recorded and have received additional support compared to 27% of all students.

During 22-23 the reporting system changed regarding this data and so subsequent data will be based on level of need (in receipt of support) as opposed to the number of concerns raised.

The data for 22-23 shows that 63% of pupil premium students are in receipt of additional pastoral support compared to 65% of all students
4.

Our initial research with parents of GCSE disadvantaged students resulted in a 20% return rate in 21-22. This suggests a challenge to communication with parents and carers and sharing of information or gaining feedback.

During 22-23 we developed parent/carer feedback surveys after Progress Evening which on average had a 36% response rate. Whilst this shows progress, further work is needed to develop communication with parents and carers.

Intended outcomes

This explains the outcomes we are aiming for by the end of our current strategy plan, and how we will measure whether they have been achieved.

Intended outcome Success criteria
To maintain and improve attainment amongst disadvantaged students and ensure they can achieve in line with all students

GCSE grades to demonstrate a continued narrowing gap between disadvantaged and non-disadvantaged students.

A focus on investigating the gap last year in Art, French and Computer Science and narrowing it this year.
For all students to have good access to a digital device and the opportunity to develop key digital skills

Conversations and surveys to confirm all disadvantaged students have access to a digital device.

To map the provision of digital skills across the school journey: communication, processing information and digital safety.
To develop safeguarding and pastoral provision to promote social, emotional and mental health (SEMH) awareness and support for all students

A developed pastoral team with layers of support for improve student levels of SEMH, to reduce the number of high-level interventions/referrals required for students in the longer term.

To support and improve wellbeing, academic resilience and growth mindset for all students, including those who are disadvantaged

Sustained high levels of wellbeing, academic resilience and growth mindset from 2024/25 demonstrated by: 

  • qualitative data from student voice, student and parent surveys and teacher observations. 
  • a significant increase in participation in enrichment activities, particularly among disadvantaged pupils.     
To enhance the frequency and information sharing with families of all students, to support learning and build the relationship with school

To develop pastoral communications to all families and integrate parent surveys, with some focused Pupil Premium parent surveys. To trial phone call consultations for parents and carers.

To analyse this information and use it to develop the school’s strategy.

Activity in this academic year

This details how we intend to spend our Pupil Premium (and recovery premium funding) this academic year to address the challenges listed above.

Teaching (for example, CPD, recruitment and retention) 

Budgeted cost: £35,011

Table Heading Table Heading Challenge number(s) addressed
Developing meta-cognitive and self-regulation skills in all pupils, with a focus on growth mindset.
This will involve ongoing teacher training and support.

Teaching metacognitive strategies to pupils can be an inexpensive method to help pupils become more independent learners.

 

EEF Meta-cognition

EEF Changing mindsets
1, 2, 3

Developing the approach to assessment across the curriculum to include low stakes.

This will involve ongoing teacher training and support.

Low stakes assessment has a range of positive impacts such as:

Improved retrieval, knowledge, skills and organisation of learning

 

Research school low stakes

1, 2, 3
Developing a school map of digital literacy development. This will involve cross-curricular cooperation and overseeing.

In 2019, approximately 214,000 job vacancies in the UK were hard to fill because of a lack of skills among applicants, and a third of this skills gap was digital.

 

Times Higher Education
2

Targeted academic support (for example, tutoring, one-to-one support structured interventions)

Budgeted cost: £21,671

Activity Evidence that supports this approach Challenge number(s) addressed
Supervised study support mentors for GCSE students and character and academic mentoring for all year groups to improve wellbeing, academic resilience and growth mindset. This includes revision packs and revision skills sessions.

Mentoring with a focus on metacognition and self-regulation enables students to think about their own learning more explicitly and is very high impact.

EEF Metacognition and self-regulation
2, 3, 4

Wider strategies (for example, related to attendance, behaviour, wellbeing)

Budgeted cost: £71,000

Activity Evidence that supports this approach Challenge number(s) addressed

Ensuring access to an equal school experience to all students, e.g. Free School Meals and a bursary to all students as well as extra-curricular opportunities which are on offer in school, e.g. trips, music lessons and lunchtime activities, all of which support student wellbeing and resilience.

These elements enhance the cultural capital of our students to support their success in the wider world.

 

Our school values the importance of cultural capital for students to succeed and not just learn within the confines of a subject. This is specifically evidenced when supporting applications to Higher Education or companies (employability skills).
1, 2, 3, 4
Investment in programmes to enhance students’ wider skills, e.g. SEMH and academic resilience, e.g. independent learning skills.

Working with a range of providers to deliver training to staff and/or students.

Deliver exam anxiety workshops as part of the PSHE programme

 

Anna Freud Headstart Programme

Sleuth
1, 3
Investment in digital devices and digital skills development. The working world is predominantly digitally based and so it is important for students to complete school with these key employability skills, as evidenced by company and university requirements. 2
Develop parental engagement so that families are involved in supporting their child’s academic learning.

Parental engagement has a positive impact on progress, especially when tailored to show positive dialogue about learning and when personalised.

 

EEF Parental engagement
4

Total budgeted cost: £127,682

Part B: Review of outcomes in the previous academic year

Pupil Premium strategy outcomes

This details the impact that our Pupil Premium activity had on pupils in the 2022 to 2023 academic year.

  Non-Pupil Premium Students Pupil Premium Students Overall School Figure
% who achieved 5 or more GCSE grades 4-9 including English and Maths. 100 100 100
Attainment 8 78.5 79.9 78.6

 

The GCSE 2023 data demonstrates no significant attainment gap in achievement. The Progress 8 score was 1.36 for pupil premium students versus 0.90 for non-pupil premium students.  In Maths pupil premium students scored 2.85 compared to non-pupil premium students scoring 1.86, and this was seen in English as well with 2.21 versus 1.52. The strategies used to raise the achievement of all students and narrow the gap between pupil premium students and non-pupil premium students are working and need to be maintained.

During the academic year 2022-23, the PPG was used in a variety of ways to support students to close the gap in curriculum and extracurricular opportunities. As a result, it reinforced aspects of our School Development Plan: providing excellent teaching and learning, character development and wellbeing for all students. Examples of additional resources which were made available to students include Educake; an online platform which offers revision materials and recap quizzes to help develop memory and retrieval. This year low stakes retrieval practice has been embedded across subjects as well as continued CPD regarding retrieval practice. This has had positive results in attainment, as well as contributing towards supporting students with their mental health as it offers a manageable way to revise. We have delivered study skills sessions in Year 10 which covered: practice, using feedback, extended writing, memory, chunking and vocabulary development. We have hosted specialist workshops for Years 10 and 11 with regards to being “exam ready” and an external company has delivered strategies to manage revision, preparation and examination anxiety.

Year 12 mentoring to Year 11 students is now a permanent part of our provision as Year 11 students reflected that they feel their learning improved and their confidence was also improved from peer mentoring.

In the last academic year, 14% of the concerns raised within school were regarding pupil premium students, whereas in 2021-22 8% of concerns raised were regarding pupil premium students. However, it must be noted that the school reporting system changed during this academic year to record all student information centrally and so it is not the same data set to compare with regards to the number of concerns that were raised in 2021-22. Of the students who were receiving additional safeguarding or pastoral interventions during 2022-23, 11% were pupil premium students compared to 29% of non-pupil premium students. We continued to ensure student support was accessible to all students and engage with parents and carers to support individual students.

 

The student support provision has been reviewed and is continuing to be reviewed, to ensure that support is in line with students’ needs. We have developed the services which are available in school and offer mentoring to students. We have continued with the annual school survey, in November 2022, and this data continues to inform our next steps with developing our student provision. For example, there is a need for continued support around anxiety which informed the hosting of the specialist workshop mentioned for years 10 and 11 students to be “exam ready”.

There is a wide range of extra-curricular opportunities that are available to students and attendance is high. 46% of Pupil Premium students attend at least one club, compared to 49% of non-Pupil Premium students. The offer for students continues to develop and more students are setting up their own clubs for other students.

As restricted access to IT resources can be a barrier to students’ progress, we have continued to narrow any digital divide for students, to support learning outside of the classroom. All GCSE pupil premium students are checked to ensure they have digital access at home and school has provided a laptop if this has not been the case. As other requests have come into school we have, so far, been able to offer the loan of a laptop to support learning outside of the classroom. All students have been informed of the filtering and monitoring standards within school and that there are systems in place for safeguarding purposes.

We have reviewed the key digital skills required for the workplace the revised Personal Development whole school programme, integrates digital citizenship as well as other employability skills.

We have established family surveys which are issued in conjunction with Progress Evenings which allows us to gain feedback from families, as well as offering another opportunity for families to ask questions. From these surveys, we have been able to address specific queries, and we also sent an email to answer more generalised questions and share more information about our school and the opportunities available.