How can the school support my Service child and my family?

A warm welcome to all new and existing Service children and their families. 

On this page, you will find information to support your transition in to, or out of, the local area; a Local Authority resource to support you and your family; information about the Service Pupil Premium; details about our school’s Base Club, open to all Service children; how Emotional Literacy support sessions are offered to Service children; and how you can readily provide us with information about mobility and separation, and any pastoral needs that may result for your child.

The Children's Education Advisory Service website holds a great deal of information for Forces families that you may find useful if you are moving to or away from our school

Hampshire has the largest population of pupils from Service families of all local authorities, representing all branches of the armed forces.  To support service families, the Local Authority has produced a resource document which you may find useful.

Service Pupil Premium

The Department for Education (DfE) introduced the Service pupil premium (SPP) in April 2011 in recognition of the specific challenges children from Service families face and as part of the commitment to delivering the armed forces covenant.

State schools, academies and free schools in England, which have children of Service families in school years reception to year 11, can receive the SPP funding. It is designed to assist the school in providing the additional support that these children may need and is currently worth £335 per Service child who meets the eligibility criteria.

The purpose of the Service Pupil Premium is to:

1) Enable schools to offer mainly pastoral support to eligible pupils during challenging times;

2) Help mitigate the negative impact on Service children of family mobility (postings) and parental deployment;

3) Help improve the academic progress of eligible pupils if we deem this to be a priority.

Further guidance on the Service Pupil Premium, along with eligibility criteria, can be found here.

Base Club

Base Club is a weekly lunchtime club for Service children run by Mrs Cousins, one of our Learning Support Assistants within the school.  Through pastoral support and celebration of our Service children’s community, Base Club normalises the children’s lifestyles and unpicks the challenges faced by them and their families. It promotes personal growth and pride of the children who attend, enhances knowledge amongst other staff members and creates a community of children who support each other.

Previously, Base Club children have written to members of the Royal British Legion - who the children met and connected with during Armed Forced Day - which deepens their understanding of their place in the history of the military community, particularly as we are now a Royal British Legion affiliated school. This creates belonging and a sense of self and those children who attend Base Club openly discuss their pride at being part of it.

Base Club children are also supported and take a leading role through the following initiatives:

• Organising and running the annual Armed Forces Day celebrations for the school
• Attendance at a Christmas Service party social event for children and families
• Afternoon tea with the Royal British Legion
• School representation at the Remembrance Day parade and the laying of a wreath
• Children presented with medals following a parent’s deployment
• Communication support with a deployed parent
• A deployed parent pack for children
• Use of the Reading Force materials
• Little Troopers workshops and learning materials (including the sunflower initiative)
• Month of April – Military child paintings
• Service child representation as part of the recent Coronation celebrations

ELSA and Pastoral Support

ELSA (Emotional Literacy Support Assistant) sessions are open to all children within our setting. Service children are entitled to ELSA support more quickly if they are facing one of the challenges noted in the government guidance and also for 1) deployment 2) postings. ELSA would also be offered for other needs which are not necessarily part of the Service child lifestyle, but their may be a waiting list for these sessions to begin.

We need your support to quickly capture any information relating to pastoral support that your child may need, both now and in the future.  We wish to understand and mitigate factors affecting any Service child, such as mobility and separation, and request that you complete our online form at your earliest opportunity so that we are aware of current upcoming factors that may affect your child, and can begin to consider ways in which we support them pastorally, if it is needed.