Pupil Premium

Education has the power to change everything. At Chertsey High School, we aim to ensure that every child gets the best deal in every lesson, every interaction and every experience of every day in school.

At Chertsey High School we are committed to supporting our students achieve their full potential in all areas of school life and believe that their academic progress should not be impacted by their personal circumstances or vulnerabilities. Research shows that young people who have a background with less wealth tend to make less progress in school compared to young people who are from backgrounds with more financial support. The government allocates Pupil Premium funding to schools to break this cycle of underachievement for these young people, who are referred to as Disadvantaged Learners. Students who have been in receipt of Free School Meals at any stage in the last six years, have been adopted from care or who are currently looked after under the auspices of the local authority qualify as Disadvantaged Learners. Schools also receive additional funding to support the children whose parents/carers are in the armed forces. Schools are free to spend the Pupil Premium (‘PP’) as they see fit. However, schools are to be held accountable for how the PP has been used.

Our strategies for improving the performance of disadvantaged students are based on research by The National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER) which identified that schools which made the biggest difference were guided by these seven principles for success:

• Whole-school ethos of attainment for all
• Addressing behaviour and attendance
• High quality teaching for all
• Meeting individual learning needs
• Deploying staff effectively
• Data-driven and responding to evidence
• Clear, responsive leadership

At Chertsey High School we believe that we embody these building blocks every day in our support for our Disadvantaged Learners. We recognise that this is not a process that ever stops and are committed to continuing this work so that every student can achieve their full potential. We prioritise high quality teaching across the whole school. We recognise that sometimes students will need additional support to achieve their potential; we use the Pupil Premium funding to support whole-school initiatives as well as intervention programmes, specifically targeted at individual Disadvantaged Learners.

In the current academic year, there are 168 disadvantaged learners on roll across Year 7- 11, comprising of 20% of our student body. 

PP Strategy 2023-2024