Research School Network: Yate Academy case study

Our main Pupil Premium strategy is to improve the teaching for everyone!

Yate Academy is a secondary school located in the town of Yate in South Gloucestershire, just outside Bristol. Over a quarter of our students attract pupil premium funding. The achievement of our disadvantaged pupils has narrowed over the past three years and the absolute attainment for pupil premium students in 2019 is well above the national average.

Our pupil premium strategy, like other schools in our Trust, is largely centred around improving the quality of teaching and learning for all our students. Whilst some targeted funding is used for specific projects, such as for Teach First recruitment and our work with the Brilliant Club on getting more disadvantaged students into selective universities, the majority is spent on getting it right in the classroom first time.

We have found that by spending our additional funding on improving teaching and learning, such as by recruiting high quality teachers, and creating the time and space for regular fortnightly instructional coaching to happen, the quality of learning for all students, particularly the more disadvantaged, has improved considerably. Our teachers teach all students the same way and have the same level of high expectation for all.

The EEF tiered approach for Pupil Premium spending and the dispelling of the four myths has proved extremely helpful in shaping our approach to our most disadvantaged students and making sure that when we do use targeted interventions, we are using the best possible data to isolate specific learning needs, rather than a catch-all approach to certain student groups.

We don’t teach Pupil Premium students and by treating them the same as everyone else we have been able to improve the outcomes for our most disadvantaged.