The IFS’ latest report highlights funding pressures, the loss of tools for addressing the attainment gap and more
For the past six years, the Nuffield Foundation has funded a major programme of work by the Institute for Fiscal Studies, monitoring and analysing funding arrangements and expenditure across all phases of the education system. A vast array of briefing papers and other outputs from this project are now gathered on the programme’s microsite. The site is an authoritative source of data, analysis and insight on all aspects of funding, with deep dives into specific, high-priority and timely issues. At its heart are the set-piece annual reports that enable policymakers, educators, researchers and the wider public to look at the whole education landscape, and to understand the latest changes and trends.
This year’s report is – as ever – comprehensive, investigative and eye-opening. It is very hard to select headline findings and messages from an overwhelming choice on offer, but panning out to look at the big issues four might be highlighted.
This important report shines a light across the education funding landscape, helping hold the government to account on its real-terms spending plans for provision for pupils and students in different phases. It shows that aspirations to ‘level up’ education achievement and opportunities both in geographic terms and in narrowing the socio-economic disadvantage gap are being stifled by a range of funding policies and trends.Josh Hillman, Director of Education
Findings from the report
First, the fact that costs in schools and other educational providers perennially run ahead of general inflation mean that ostensible increases in funding continue not to be reflected in real budgets or actual provision. This is in a context in which spending on education as a proportion of national income has dropped substantially from its peak in 2010. It explains why the view from the chalk face always feels more austere than that from the Chancellor’s desk in the Treasury.
Second, not widely observed in public discourse, we have seen a major convergence in recent decades in per capita public expenditure on children and young people in different phases of their education. Previously the older the pupil or student was, the more would be spent on them, with massive differentials. The narrowing of these differentials since at least the late 1980s continued this year and is well highlighted in the report. Given the formative role of education for younger children this general trend may well be something to celebrate.
Third, this year sees further erosion of funding measures that have attempted to skew resources towards more disadvantaged children, whether that be real-term levels of Pupil Premium for children from free school meal families in early years and schools, other aspects of school funding formulae, or eligibility arrangements for free childcare entitlements.
These losses are a particular concern if we are serious about addressing the attainment gap between disadvantaged children and their peers. Even before the COVID-19 pandemic, this gap had started to widen again following several years of narrowing. It is now clear from a wealth of evidence that the lockdown, other aspects of the pandemic, and its aftermath all significantly exacerbated the gap.
The challenges for schools and other providers in helping a whole generation whose education was affected to catch up to where they would have been otherwise is particularly acute for children and young people from poorer backgrounds. On average their learning loss was greater, they and their families faced more severe mental health and well-being challenges, and their return to normal schooling was much slower.
Fourth, policies such as ‘Education Investment Areas’ have been pursued by the UK government as key tools for addressing the persistent geographic inequalities in educational achievement and opportunities seen at all levels of the system, and are part of its ‘levelling up’ agenda. It is clear from this report that so far are too limited to be registering significant impact on funding levels to shift the dial on educational outcomes in specific parts of England.
The Nuffield Foundation is proud to have funded the programme of work on education spending from its inception, and it remains one of our most powerful investments, with its annual reports and outputs very visible and well-used. We would like to thank Luke Sibieta and the many members of the IFS staff who have worked in such a dedicated fashion to bring this report together.
