£10m social mobility initiative set to launch

As part of the drive, a five-year £8m project being run by Northern Rock Foundation and the Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) will aim to improve literacy skills for disadvantaged primary school pupils in the North East of England. 

A further £2m has been set aside to recruit a network of advocates who will work to support disadvantaged children in their schools.

The combined drive will focus on schools with the highest levels of disadvantaged pupils but the organisations said they will work in some capacity with all 880 primary schools in the region.

It follows a report last month by the Institute for Public Policy Research that found less than half (47 per cent) of children from deprived families in the north of England reach a good level of development by the age of five, which is 12 percentage points behind disadvantaged children living in London.

Kevan Collins, chief executive of the EEF, said good literacy is fundamental to success in secondary school and later in life, but children's chances of leaving primary school without decent reading and writing skills is significantly increased if they come from a poor home.
 
“We hope the campaign will leave a lasting legacy of evidence-based programmes and effective practice in the region, building on the good work already under way in schools,” he said.  
 
Dame Jackie Fisher, trustee of Northern Rock Foundation, said evidence shows that children who do not read well by age 11 have significantly less chance of achieving good GCSEs and of moving into work.

"We hope this programme will help to break a cycle of poor literacy amongst disadvantaged children in the North East, and improve the lives and employability of young people across our region,” she said.