An alternative approach to helping looked-after children gain good grades

4 October 2010 1 min read John Freeman Education Social Care

When middle-class children fall behind at school, the parental response is often special tutoring. In London, tutoring for secondary school admission is a substantial industry, and in Birmingham almost all children being put in for grammar school tests are tutored. I'm not judging this, by the way, I was tutored (fruitlessly) for my French O-level; and we paid for extra music lessons whenever needed.

But when I became a corporate parent responsible for the education of looked-after children, my immediate response was to help them in the same way as sharp-elbowed parents helped their own children. So I was delighted when we were asked to pilot a home tutoring scheme funded by a high-street bank. Not surprisingly, it worked - the evidence of improved outcomes was clear. Our model was particularly effective; we employed teachers who already knew and worked with the children concerned. But it cost a lot of money and we were not exactly surprised that when the credit crunch arrived the bank's funding dried up.

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