Pupil Premium

Pupil premium is funding to improve education outcomes for disadvantaged pupils in schools in England. Evidence shows that disadvantaged children generally face additional challenges in reaching their potential at school and often do not perform as well as other pupils.

Our aim at St Michael’s is that all of our students, irrespective of their ability or the challenges they face, achieve well and have access to opportunities which will enhance their life chances. This aim reflects our Christian values which underpin every aspect of the education that we provide for our students.

We want all our students to become independent learners who engage positively with their own education, who thrive to achieve the best they can and who are healthy, happy and optimistic about their futures. 

The focus of our pupil premium strategy is to ensure that our disadvantaged students are supported at all stages of their educational journey by providing high quality teaching across the whole curriculum, access to targeted academic support when there is an identified need and other wider strategies such as pastoral and academic mentoring and the provision of technology for learning. 

Fundamental to the aims of our pupil premium strategy is high quality teaching. This has proven to have the greatest impact on closing the disadvantage attainment gap and is at the heart of improving the outcomes for all the students at St Michael’s. Our focus is to continue to develop the principles of instruction as a teaching framework as well as ensuring that quality first teaching strategies are used throughout lessons. Research also informs us that the depth and breadth of a child’s vocabulary has a direct impact on academic achievement and the vocabulary ‘gap’ between disadvantaged and non-disadvantaged pupils further disadvantages students as they progress through education. We therefore consider the development of vocabulary is key to improving academic outcomes across all disciplines and seek to achieve this aim through a robust and sustained approach to the teaching of literacy and oracy using established programmes and classroom practice. 

An integral part of our pupil premium strategy is the utilisation of targeted intervention strategies such as 1 to 3 academic tutoring delivered by our own staff as well as through the National Tutoring programme as part of our school plan for education recovery in the wake of COVID 19. 

As a school, we know our pupils well, including the challenges that disadvantage may have on their academic progress, how it may affect their well-being or limit their aspirations. We use this knowledge as well as robust diagnostic assessment to identify the needs of our students on an individual basis.  

The outcomes of disadvantaged students are the responsibility of all at St Michael’s and our key strategy aims reflect this by ensuring: 

• the delivery of high quality teaching by all classroom teachers 

• a robust approach to interventions which are timely and appropriate  

• a culture of high expectations whereby all of our students are challenged to achieve the best they can