Spending Review: Experts call for £13.5bn for education recovery
Joe Lepper
Thursday, October 21, 2021
Education experts have called on the government to significantly boost the funding package available to help pupils recover from the Covid-19 health crisis.
They want to see an education recovery settlement of £13.5bn over the next three years, to combat learning loss and to prevent long term damage to the education and welfare of pupils.
This marks a marked increase on the current funding allocation of £3.1bn.
The call has been made in an Education Policy Institute report ahead of the next week’s Spending Review.
The report also points out the potential long-term cost savings to the UK economy by investing now to support pupils.
If the government fails to offer the £13.5bn recovery settlement, pupils face losing at least £16,000 in future earnings, rising to £46,000 among the hardest hit pupils, researchers warn.
This includes disadvantaged pupils, who were already 18 months of learning behind their more affluent peers prior to the pandemic, by the time they take their GCSEs, found the EPI.
“Losses to earnings would result in total lost national income running into the hundreds of billions – leading to substantial reductions in contributions to public services, and lower productivity and economic growth,” says the EPI.
It also warns ministers that their "levelling up agenda" is at risk due to particular loss of learning among pupils in the north of England and the Midlands.
Per pupil spending on education recovery in the England is also lagging behind other countries, the EPI report points out. While in England the figure is £310 per pupil, the amount is around £2,000 in the US and The Netherlands.
Among findings from the report is that the average learning loss among primary school pupils by March 2021 is 3.5 months in maths and 2.2 months in reading.
NEW: Today we have released our latest education recovery research, finding that significant, additional funding will be required in next week’s Spending Review in order to avoid long-term damage to pupils and the economy.
— Education Policy Institute (@EduPolicyInst) October 21, 2021
📘 Read the key findings here ⬇️https://t.co/QLnGntHQ95
“The government’s existing education recovery plans have fallen well short of what the evidence says is required to support pupils – but it now has the opportunity to prioritise recovery in the forthcoming spending review", said EPI chief executive Natalie Perera.
Luke Sibieta, EPI research fellow and co-author of the report, added: “The level of lost learning seen by pupils in England is considerable. Left unaddressed, our modelling shows that these losses may have adverse consequences for millions of pupils, negatively affecting their lifetime earnings. In total, this could cost the government hundreds of billions in national income.
“We need to see more ambitious efforts to repair the damage done by the pandemic to pupils’ learning. Funding for education programmes significantly trails those seen in other rich countries such as the US and the Netherlands.
“This should be met with a targeted approach to support that acknowledges pupils in certain areas of the country have taken a far greater hit to their education than others.”
Early Intervention Foundation chief executive Jo Casebourne said that the EPI report “puts into perspective the shocking impact the pandemic has had on young people, especially in certain parts of the country and among more disadvantaged pupils”.
She added: “To ensure any programme of learning catch-up works we believe it needs to go hand-in-hand with a focus on mental health and wellbeing.”
