Supporting Service Children at Brampton Village Primary School
At Brampton Village Primary School, we are committed to providing support to children of service members or service partners of serving and ex-Armed Forces personnel in line with the Service Pupil Premium.
What is the Service Pupil Premium?
The Department for Education introduced the Service Pupil Premium (SPP) in April 2011 in recognition of the specific challenges children from service families face and as part of the commitment to delivering the Armed Forces Covenant
The Armed Forces Covenant
This is a promise from the nation that those who serve or have served in the Armed Forces and their families are treated fairly. The covenant’s purpose is to redress the disadvantages that the Armed Forces community might experience in contrast to other citizens, and to honour the sacrifices they have made.
State schools, academies and free schools in England, that have children of service families in school years Reception to Year 11, can receive the SPP funding. It is designed to assist the school in providing the additional support that these children may need and is currently worth £335 per service child who meets the eligibility criteria.
Eligibility criteria
Pupils attract the SPP if they meet the following criteria:
- one of their parents is serving in the regular Armed Forces
- they have been registered as a ‘service child’ in the school census at any point since 2011
- one of their parents died whilst serving in the Armed Forces and the pupil receives a pension under the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme or the War Pensions Scheme
- pupils with a parent who is on full commitment as part of the full-time reserve service are classed as service children
The purpose of the Service Pupil Premium
Eligible schools receive the SPP so that they can offer mainly pastoral support during challenging times and to help mitigate the negative impact on service children of family mobility or parental deployment.
Mobility is when a service family is posted from one location to another, including overseas and within the UK.
Deployment is when a service person is serving away from home for a period of time. This could be a 6-to-9-month tour of duty, a training course or an exercise which could last for a few weeks.
Ways we use the Service Pupil Premium in Brampton Village Primary School
- allocated time with our pastoral teaching assistant to support service children who have needed emotional support at any given time.
- purchase of resources that relate to mental health and wellbeing of a child with a parent/s serving in the Armed Forces.
- Transport/ adult release time for specific service children’s events such as Remembrance Day and events organised at RAF Wyton.
If your child is eligible and you feel there is a specific resource which may help your child in either understanding or coping with the service life-please speak with our allocated Service Child Champion, Jane Talbot, so we can arrange a meeting to discuss. Please email office@brampton.cambs.sch.uk to get on touch.