The Pupil Premium Grant (PPG) is allocated directly by the Education Funding Authority to Academies and Free Schools and to the local authority to pass on to its maintained schools and non-maintained special schools (NMSS) for children entitled to free school meals, Looked After Children (LAC) and those whose parents are serving in the armed forces (service children) up to year 11.

Looked-after children (LAC) are defined in the Children Act 1989 as one who is in the care of, or provided with accommodation by, an English local authority. For the Robert Ogden School, these are usually the pupils resident at Clayton Croft Children’s Home or Thurnscoe House and Studios.

Local authorities (LAs) may allocate PPG to other alternative provision settings or use the grant to spend specifically on additional educational support to raise the standard of attainment for the eligible pupils. LAs must consult the non-mainstream settings about how the LA uses PPG to support children educated in non-mainstream settings. For example, they can use the grant towards the fees charged by the school.

Where children are educated at an Independent School such as Robert Ogden, which is classed as an alternative provision setting, the PPG is sent to the local authority of that child, not to the school. Where the PPG has been allocated because the pupil is a Looked After Child (LAC), the LAC premium must be managed by the local authority’s designated virtual school head (VSH) and used for the benefit of the looked-after child’s educational needs as described in their personal education plan.

The VSH should ensure there are arrangements in place to discuss how the child will benefit from pupil premium funding with the designated teacher in the child’s education setting.

Both Sheffield City Council and East Riding of Yorkshire Council have informed the school that their policy is that any funds (currently £2,300 per year per LAC pupil) they receive from the Department of Education per LAC placed with the school will be used towards the school's fees. Other local authorities pass on some or all of the PPG which been allocated to them. However, the school is not informed of what proportion of the allocation has been passed on to the school.

Currently, the school receives PPG from only seven LAs out of the 17 who have pupils placed at the school.

We do not publish very specific details on this site of where the allocated PPG is spent as this might identify the pupil concerned.