Pupil Premium: Why It Starts With Culture and How Schools Can Review for Real Impact

Starting with the evidence: what we know works

The purpose of the pupil premium is clear: to improve outcomes for disadvantaged pupils and reduce the persistent attainment gap that exists between pupils from low-income backgrounds and their peers. Despite significant investment, the gap remains stubborn, widening in some phases following the pandemic. This makes effective use of pupil premium funding not just a statutory requirement, but a moral one.  

The Department for Education is explicit that schools should use pupil premium funding in line with a menu of approaches, prioritising high-quality teaching, targeted academic support, and wider strategies that enable pupils to attend, belong, and succeed. Crucially, schools are expected to publish an annual pupil premium strategy statement using the DfE template, showing how decisions are informed by evidence and evaluated over time. 

The Education Endowment Foundation (EEF) reinforces this message. Its Guide to the Pupil Premium makes it clear that there are no silver bullets; instead, impact comes from doing fewer things better, grounded in a deep understanding of pupils’ needs and strong evidence of what works. The EEF advocates a disciplined cycle:  

1. Diagnose needs
2. Use evidence
3. Implement effectively
4. Monitor and evaluate

This is not a checklist but a way of thinking that places pupils at the centre of decision-making. Diagnosing need requires leaders to look beyond surface data and really understand the lived experience of disadvantaged pupils in their school. Using evidence means being curious and critical, drawing on trusted research while remaining alert to what will work in context.

Strong implementation depends on leadership clarity, staff expertise and time, while meaningful monitoring focuses on whether strategies are making a difference, not simply whether they are being delivered. When followed with integrity over time, this process helps schools build coherence, avoid initiative fatigue and ensure that resources are directed where they will have the greatest impact. This evidence base matters, though, for me, it starts before this.

Pupil premium starts with culture and ethos

In our work with schools, one of the clearest lessons is this: pupil premium strategies succeed or fail based on culture.

Where disadvantaged pupils flourish, leaders share a deep moral purpose. There is an unwavering belief that disadvantage is not destiny, and this belief is visible in everyday practice: in expectations, in relationships, and in how decisions are made. We know from research that high-quality teaching has the greatest impact on disadvantaged pupils and should be the top priority for pupil premium spending. Culture determines whether this principle is lived out. If it is linked with other priorities there is more chance for pedagogical approaches to consider all vulnerable pupils including our pupil premium children. If supporting disadvantaged pupils is competing against other school priorities for a place at the table, rather than being aligned this is where we as a school can often lose focus.

The DfE guidance and the EEF reinforces this that pupil premium should not sit separately from school improvement, but be tightly aligned to it, addressing the specific barriers pupils face in that context. 

This means asking difficult questions:

• Do all staff understand who our disadvantaged pupils are?
• Are our best teachers teaching those who need them most?
• Is high-quality teaching consistently strong across the school?
• Do our systems and routines communicate that every pupil belongs?

From intention to implementation: reviewing pupil premium meaningfully

We are so busy in school and there is so much to do with so many plates to spin. Because of this and often unintentionially, a pupil premium review is occasionally reduced to compliance: a document updated each December, outdated data, and a list of activities rather than a coherent strategy. 

However, if aligned to the school priorities and time is given to a strong review process each year then the process, the actions that follow, and the commitment to pupil premium over time can be transformational for our vulnerable pupils. A robust pupil premium review should be structured around the following stages, aligned with both DfE and EEF guidance.

1. Clarify purpose and ambition

Start with the why. What are your ultimate objectives for disadvantaged pupils in your school? Academic outcomes matter, but so do attendance, engagement, wellbeing and post-school destinations. The DfE template explicitly asks schools to articulate their intent and principles.

Strong pupil premium strategies are anchored in moral purpose. Leaders who are most successful are clear about the difference they want to make in pupils’ lives and use this ambition to drive decision-making at every level. This clarity helps schools resist reactive spending and ensures that pupil premium work is not reduced to a collection of disconnected initiatives, but instead forms a coherent, long-term strategy aligned with school improvement priorities.

Review questions:

• Is there a shared, explicit ambition for disadvantaged pupils?
• Is this ambition visible in the wider school development plan?

2. Diagnose barriers precisely

Effective strategies are rooted in a sharp diagnosis of need, not assumptions about disadvantage. This requires triangulating data: attainment, progress, attendance, behaviour, qualitative pupil voice and staff insight.

A strong diagnostic phase moves schools away from generic labels and towards a nuanced understanding of pupils’ lived experiences. Barriers are rarely purely academic; they often sit at the intersection of curriculum access, attendance, language, wellbeing and wider family circumstance. Schools that invest time here are better able to target support, avoid over-intervention and respond flexibly as needs change over time.

Review questions:

• What are the actual barriers faced by pupils in this school?
• Which barriers are systemic, and which affect specific groups or individuals?

3. Evaluate the use of evidence

Both the DfE and EEF expect schools to draw on strong evidence when choosing approaches, particularly where significant funding is allocated. The EEF Toolkit is an excellent tool to use in considering this. A review should interrogate not just what is being funded, but why.

Using evidence well does not mean chasing new programmes or outsourcing responsibility. Instead, it involves thoughtful engagement with research, professional judgement and contextual knowledge. Evidence should help schools prioritise high-impact approaches, challenge assumptions about “what has always been done”, and ensure that if interventions occur then they complement, rather than compensate for, the quality of everyday classroom teaching.

Review questions:

• Which strategies are underpinned by robust evidence?
• Are we prioritising high-quality teaching before layering interventions?
• Are interventions implemented as intended?

4. Assess implementation and capacity

Even evidence-based approaches fail with weak implementation. The EEF highlights leadership, staff training and fidelity as critical success factors.

Implementation is where strategies succeed or unravel. Reviews should explore whether staff understand the rationale behind approaches, have the time and training to deliver them well, and receive ongoing support. Capacity matters: stretching existing teams too thinly or relying on good will alone undermines sustainability. Effective schools align professional development, line management and deployment decisions tightly to pupil premium priorities.

Review questions:

• Do staff have the skills and time to deliver this well?
• Is professional development aligned to pupil premium priorities?
• Are roles and responsibilities clear?

5. Evaluate impact and value for money

Impact evaluation should go beyond headline outcomes. The DfE expects schools to demonstrate how spending decisions are reviewed and refined over time.

Meaningful evaluation considers both outcomes and process. It asks whether strategies are improving pupils’ experiences, confidence and engagement and whether improvements are sustained. Value for money is not about cost alone, but about impact relative to investment. Strong schools are prepared to stop doing things that are well-intentioned but ineffective and to scale those approaches that demonstrably work.

Review questions:

• What difference is this making for pupils?
• Which strategies offer the strongest impact relative to cost?
• What should we stop, adapt or scale?

How One Education support pupil premium reviews

At One Education, we believe pupil premium review should be supportive, rigorous and empowering, not punitive. Our work is grounded in national guidance and local context, supporting schools to build sustainable capacity rather than shortterm fixes.  We are proud that One Education consultants have undertaken DfE Pupil Premium Reviewer training, enabling us to deliver DfE-aligned, evidence-informed pupil premium reviews. These reviews:

• Align fully with DfE guidance and the EEF framework
• Provide an external, professional lens on strategy, culture and impact
• Support leaders to identify strengths as well as priorities for development
• Result in clear, practical recommendations linked to school improvement

Importantly, our reviews focus not just on compliance, but on culture, leadership and practice because that is where pupil premium truly lives.

Final reflections

The pupil premium is one of the most powerful levers we have to disrupt educational inequality. Used well, it strengthens teaching, sharpens systems and transforms life chances. When culture is right, evidence is used intelligently, and review is honest and disciplined, pupil premium becomes what it was always intended to be: an engine for equity, excellence and social justice. Used poorly, it becomes another paper exercise. For me the difference lies in whether schools start with funding, with a paper exercise, or with culture and ethos.