Guidance

National Tutoring Programme: guidance for schools – academic year 2023 to 2024

Updated 3 September 2024

Applies to England

The National Tutoring Programme (NTP) provided primary and secondary schools with funding to spend on targeted academic support, delivered by tutors and mentors.

The NTP was a time limited four-year programme that was launched in 2020 under the previous government. The programme has now ended.

Strong evidence suggests that the model of targeted academic support, through trained tutors working with small groups and individuals, can make several months’ difference to academic progress.

We asked schools to target tutoring towards pupils who are eligible for the pupil premium or those below the expected standard or grade boundary in an applicable subject, but we recognised that tuition might be used to support a variety of pupils’ needs. Our approach therefore ensured a high degree of flexibility and choice, so that schools could develop tutoring that suited their requirements.

All eligible state-funded schools received NTP funding over the course of the academic year 2023 to 2024.

This funding was paid in termly instalments by the Education and Skills Funding Agency (ESFA), directly to academies and non-maintained special schools or to maintained schools via local authorities.

Local authorities also received funding for looked-after children and children they placed in independent special schools. It was intended to cover 50% of the unit cost of tuition, with the school making up the remainder of the cost using pupil premium or other core school budgets.

NTP funding was used to subsidise tuition delivered by one or a combination of the following routes:

• tuition partners: external tutoring organisations that were quality assured by our delivery partner, Tribal
• academic mentors: in-house staff members recruited on schools’ behalf by Cognition Education, and employed by schools to provide intensive support to pupils
• school-led tutoring: members of a school’s own staff, either already employed or specifically engaged for this purpose, such as supply teachers and support staff, or retired teachers

To help ensure high quality tutoring, the Education Development Trust provided free, comprehensive training for the academic mentor and school-led tutoring routes.

The academic year 2023 to 2024 was the fourth and final year of the NTP. The contracts for Cognition Education, Tribal and the Education Development Trust have now ended.

Funding and paying for tutoring

Your NTP funding allocation

All state-funded schools with pupils in years 1 to 11 who were eligible for the pupil premium received NTP funding. We published funding allocations that told you how much funding your school received and whether it was for mainstream pupils, pupils in special schools or both (as they were funded at different rates).

Schools that received the higher rate funding, including special schools, alternative-provision schools, pupil referral units, special educational needs and disabilities (SEND) units and resourced provision, will collectively be referred to as ‘special schools’ throughout this document.

For a full list of schools that received the higher funding rate, refer to the funding for special schools section.

Your NTP allocation was based on pupils eligible for the pupil premium, as recorded on the October 2022 school census. The Authority Proforma Tool (APT) was used to identify any eligible pupils with SEND in specialist units or resourced provision within mainstream schools who were eligible for the higher rate of funding.

The NTP grant used the same classifications as the pupil premium grant in determining pupil premium numbers. This included eligible pupils with no recourse to public funds, pupils recorded as eligible for free school meals at any point in the last 6 years and previously looked-after children.

To find out how much funding your school received for the academic year 2023 to 2024, see the school-level funding allocations.

For the academic year 2023 to 2024, we provided the following funding for NTP:

• mainstream schools: a minimum of £67.50 per pupil eligible for pupil premium
• special schools: a minimum of £176.25 per pupil eligible for pupil premium

Funding was paid to your school in 3 termly instalments. Schools did not need to apply for NTP funding. Any unspent funding, or funding spent outside of grant conditions, will be recovered by ESFA in the academic year 2024 to 2025.

Spending your NTP funding

For the academic year 2023 to 2024, NTP funding could be used to pay for 50% of the total cost incurred by your school to deliver tutoring. The total cost of tutoring should not have exceeded the maximum hourly per-pupil rate that applied to all NTP tutoring you provided, to ensure the cost of tutoring was not excessive.

The hourly per-pupil rates were:

• mainstream schools: £18, of which the Department for Education (DfE) subsidy was £9 (50%)
• special schools: £47, of which the DfE subsidy was £23.50 (50%)

We recommended that you used pupil premium to fund the school’s portion of the tuition cost. Tutoring is an effective use of pupil premium and is included in the menu of approaches in the guidance for school leaders.

You were able to use the NTP calculator tool to work out how much your school needed to contribute, and track information during the academic year to add to your year-end statement.

Your NTP funding allocation could be used to contribute towards on-costs (also known as employer costs) such as National Insurance and pension contributions. It could not be used for onboarding costs, such as providing Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) checks, induction training or setting an employee up on school systems.

Reporting your tutoring costs

We will ask you to report how you used your NTP grant in the year-end statement, which you can complete online from 2 September 2024 until 5pm on 26 September 2024, including:

• how much your school spent on tutoring – this should be the total amount you spent on tutoring (the portion funded by the NTP grant and the contribution from your school)
• how many hours of tutoring your school delivered – this should include every hour delivered per pupil (for example, if you delivered a 15-hour course to 3 pupils, you would count it as 45 hours)
• how many pupils in your school have received tuition

We will calculate the hourly rate for your school by dividing your total spend by your number of hours delivered. If your hourly rate is £18 or less (£47 or less for special schools), we will cover 50% of the cost you have incurred, up to your allocation.

If your hourly rate is greater than £18 (or greater than £47 for special schools), we will fund £9 per-pupil per hour (or £23.50 for special schools), up to your allocation.

These hourly per-pupil rates apply to all tutoring you delivered, whether this was through:

• your existing staff
• new staff you brought in to provide tuition
• academic mentors
• tutors engaged via a tuition partner

We will not provide any subsidy beyond your funding allocation. Schools could deliver additional tutoring using other funding.

If a tutoring session was cancelled at short notice, you can still include this in your year-end statement. This is intended to help schools or tuition partners avoid being financially penalised for circumstances beyond their control. We expect this will apply only to sessions that are cancelled with less than 24 hours’ notice.

Similarly, if a pupil missed a planned tutoring session with no warning, or with less than 24 hours’ notice, you may record them as having attended.

More information on record keeping and data returns can be found in the data, reporting and accountability section.

Funding examples

The following examples illustrate some of the funding scenarios that may occur and how you should address them, when managing your NTP funding.

Example 1: working with a tuition partner in a mainstream school

Yours is a mainstream school with a funding allocation of £5,130. By the end of the academic year, you have provided 480 pupil hours of tutoring delivered by your tuition partner, at a total cost of £8,400.

Rate calculation
Total cost	£8,400
Total pupil hours	480
Hourly per-pupil rate (total cost divided by total pupil hours)	£17.50

Funding result

Your hourly rate is within the maximum hourly rate of £18. We will subsidise 50% of the total cost you have incurred, which works out at £4,200.

This means that £930 of your initial £5,130 funding allocation is unspent. This will be recovered by ESFA in the academic year 2024 to 2025, following your completion of the year-end statement.

Your remaining cost is the difference between the total cost you have incurred and the amount met by your funding allocation. This works out at £4,200, and you will need to meet this from other funding sources such as pupil premium.

Example 2: providing school-led tutoring in a special school

Yours is a special school with a funding allocation of £2,115. You have provided 192 pupil hours of tutoring delivered by your own staff, at the maximum hourly per-pupil rate of £47, at a total cost of £9,024.

Rate calculation
Total cost	£9,024
Total pupil hours	192
Hourly per-pupil rate (total cost divided by total pupil hours)	£47

Funding result

50% of this total cost is £4,512, which is greater than your funding allocation. Your NTP funding will cover £2,115 of the total cost you have incurred.

Your remaining cost is the difference between the total cost you have incurred, and the amount met by your funding allocation. This works out at £6,909, and you will need to meet this from other funding sources such as pupil premium.

Example 3: a mixed tutoring offer in a mainstream school

Yours is a mainstream school with a funding allocation of £33,750.

You provide 2,200 pupil hours of tutoring using a tuition partner, at a total cost of £39,600. You also employ an academic mentor, at a total cost of £25,500 (salary and on-costs), who provides 1,500 pupil hours over the academic year. In total, your school has spent £65,100 on 3,700 pupil hours of tutoring.

Rate calculation
Total cost	£65,100
Total pupil hours	3,700
Hourly per-pupil rate (total cost divided by total pupil hours)	£17.59

Funding result

Because your hourly per-pupil rate is below the £18 maximum, your funding will cover 50% of the total cost you have incurred, which works out at £32,550.

This means that £1,200 of your initial funding allocation is unspent. This will be recovered by ESFA in the academic year 2024 to 2025, following your completion of the year-end statement.

Your remaining cost is the difference between the total cost you have incurred and the amount met by your funding allocation. This works out at £32,550, and you will need to meet this from other funding sources such as pupil premium.

Example 4: providing school-led tutoring in a mainstream school 

Yours is a small mainstream school with a funding allocation of £1,890.

You have paid a classroom teacher to provide tutoring for pupils after school. Your hourly per-pupil rate was £20, and the teacher delivered 150 pupil hours over the academic year, incurring a total cost of £3,000.

Rate calculation
Total cost	£3,000
Total pupil hours	150
Hourly per-pupil rate (total cost divided by total pupil hours)	£20

Funding result

Because your £20 hourly per-pupil rate is above the £18 maximum, we will cap your subsidy at £9 (50% of £18) for each of the 150 hours. This works out as £1,350, which is within your £1,890 allocation.

This means that £540 of your initial funding allocation is unspent. This will be recovered by ESFA in the academic year 2024 to 2025, following your completion of the year-end statement.

Your remaining cost is the difference between the total cost you have incurred and the amount met by your funding allocation. This works out at £1,650, and you will need to meet this from other funding sources such as pupil premium.

Planning and delivering tutoring

Schools were able to design and deliver a tutoring offer that met the needs of their pupils.

Pupil eligibility

Pupils in key stages 1 to 4 (years 1 to 11), in a state-funded school, were eligible for the NTP.

The principal objective of the NTP was to improve the attainment of disadvantaged pupils. Schools were required to consider offering tutoring to all their pupils who were eligible for the pupil premium.

We recognised that schools might also wish to offer tutoring to pupils who were not eligible for the pupil premium. When considering this group, schools should have focused on pupils who were below the expected standard or grade boundary in an applicable subject. This meant:

• primary schools should have focused on pupils who would benefit from support to meet the expected standard in English writing, English reading and maths in their end of key stage 2 national curriculum assessments (commonly known as SATs)
• secondary schools should have focused on pupils predicted to achieve grade 3 or 4 at GCSE, with a view to improving their outcomes to grade 4 or 5

Schools continued to have the discretion to offer tutoring to pupils not in the groups outlined above.

Focusing on test or grade boundaries may not have been appropriate for some pupils with SEND. Schools were instead advised to refer to the supporting pupils with special educational needs and disabilities section when considering pupils with SEND for tutoring.

Tutoring could be delivered in group sizes from 1:1 up to a maximum of 1:6, to maintain high-quality and impactful tuition.

Schools might also have wanted to consider tutoring for those pupils in receipt of pupil premium who move schools. These children may find tutoring particularly beneficial.

NTP funding could only be used to subsidise tutoring for pupils on roll at your school.

Subjects

For primary school pupils, tutoring could be provided in mathematics, English and science.

For secondary school pupils, it could be provided in mathematics, English, science, humanities and modern foreign languages.

Alternative tutoring interventions were available for pupils with SEND.

NTP funding may have been used to support pupils with English as an additional language, but not to provide teaching of English as an additional language.

Scheduling

Tutoring courses were recommended to be 12 to 15 hours long. This was to ensure a meaningful impact on pupil attainment, as evidenced through research. Schools were asked to plan their tuition with this in mind and to avoid less effective piecemeal tutoring. Schools were also able to deliver longer courses, if it met the needs of their pupils.

Tuition could take place in person or online and was to be agreed between the tutor and the school.

We expected you to organise tutoring at an appropriate time for pupils, to encourage high attendance.

If a pupil was taken out of lessons for tuition, schools must have ensured that they still had access to the full curriculum. Tutoring was also able to take place outside of the school setting or outside of core school hours.

If tutoring was provided outside of the school setting, the school was still responsible for safeguarding. This included ensuring a full risk assessment was carried out and any appropriate mitigations were put in place prior to the start of tutoring.

If a pupil was not able to attend a scheduled tutoring session due to factors beyond the school’s control, they were encouraged to make alternative arrangements. This may have involved rearranging the missed session for a time that was convenient for all parties or nominating another pupil to attend the session. If a tutoring session was cancelled with less than 24 hours’ notice you were able to include this in your year-end statement.

Tutoring outside of core school hours

Schools may have wished to provide tuition outside of core school hours, including after school, at weekends, during school breaks or the summer holidays. This was optional and was voluntary for pupils.

If an NTP tutor was employed outside of core school hours, their primary purpose was to deliver tuition. NTP funding should not have been used to provide childcare, enrichment, meals or entertainment.

The delivery guidelines for term-time tutoring arrangements also applied to tuition outside core school hours, along with the following additional considerations:

• location – tutoring could take place in person or online
• timings – you could have the flexibility to organise tutoring outside core school hours however best suits the needs of your tutors and pupils. For instance, delivering condensed summer tuition over 1 to 2 weeks or spread throughout the summer holiday
• safeguarding – schools retained their usual safeguarding responsibilities in relation to their pupils, and must have ensured a designated safeguarding lead was available for the entirety of the period in which tutoring outside of core school hours took place

Working with universities

Schools may have worked with universities to enable university students to deliver tutoring to their pupils.

To facilitate this, we provided a guide for universities outlining suggested models that could have been implemented using the tutoring routes within the programme.

Supporting pupils with special educational needs and disabilities

Tutoring to support pupils with SEND

Pupils with SEND can engage with traditional tutoring in specific school subjects, especially when it is adapted to meet additional needs.

To improve the tutoring experience and enhance academic outcomes for these pupils, schools were encouraged to consider the following steps:

• request a tuition partner with SEND specialists and work closely with tutors to discuss each pupil’s specific needs
• maintain small group sizes of 1:1 or 1:2 for pupils with SEND
• align any tutoring provision with the requirements set out in a pupil’s education, health and care plan, where applicable
• ensure learning was tailored and targeted to meet the individual needs of each pupil

Alternative tutoring interventions for pupils with SEND

We recognised that some pupils with SEND benefit from a boost to their progress in other academic areas, such as learning capabilities, sensory development and communication.

Tutoring subsidised through the NTP could have included alternative types of established, evidence-underpinned intervention for pupils with SEND, tailored and targeted to meet individual needs.

Funding for special schools

Special schools were eligible for a higher rate of funding to reflect their smaller group sizes and higher tuition costs. Your allocation informed you which rates of funding your school was awarded.

The following institutions, collectively referred to as special schools, received the higher funding rate outlined in funding and paying for tutoring:

• local-authority-maintained special schools
• non-maintained special schools
• independent special schools, where the placement is funded by the local authority
• special academies and free schools
• alternative-provision academies and free schools
• pupil referral units
• local authority-maintained hospital schools and hospital academies
• SEND units within mainstream schools
• resourced provision within mainstream schools
• virtual schools, where the looked-after child attends a specialist setting

Tuition partners

The tuition partner route allowed schools to build partnerships with expert tutoring organisations that had been quality assured by DfE. They provided schools with tutors with particular specialisms, including SEND, tuition for pupils who have English as an additional language and subject and key stage specific support. This route may have helped schools that would benefit from external resource to coordinate and deliver tutoring to pupils.

Schools could only use NTP funding on approved tuition partners listed on the find a tuition partner service. These organisations were subject to rigorous quality assurance, which included ensuring that they offered value for money to schools.

This service has now ended.

Quality assurance

Tuition partners were quality assured, and demonstrated compliance against our delivery partner Tribal’s safeguarding, safer recruitment, organisation and quality requirements.

Tutors were recruited and employed according to the standards set by each individual tuition partner.

Finding a tuition partner

The find a tuition partner service enabled schools to select a tuition partner to meet their needs.

This service filtered tuition partners by location, subject and delivery method (online or in person). Search results allowed schools to compare tuition partners by price and included contact details so schools could contact organisations directly to make tutoring arrangements.

This service has now ended.

Academic mentors

Academic mentors were salaried, in-house members of staff who worked alongside teachers to provide one-to-one and small group subject-specific tuition. This meant they could reach a large number of pupils and embed tutoring within the school.

Academic mentors were well suited to schools with high levels of disadvantage or high numbers of pupils in receipt of pupil premium.

Role and responsibilities

Academic mentors were responsible for one-to-one and small group tuition. The role involved:

• tutoring in one or multiple subject areas
• working closely with teachers to ensure tutoring content directly supports the curriculum covered in the classroom
• planning tutoring sessions and providing feedback on pupil progress
• providing tutoring during school holidays, if requested by a school

Training

Before being placed in a school, academic mentors will have undergone mandatory online training provided by the Education Development Trust.

This training consisted of various pathways and was tailored to the skills and experience of each tutor.

This training is no longer available.

School-led tutoring

The school-led tutoring route offered flexibility for schools to identify their own tutors. These may have been:

• people recruited from school staff, such as classroom teachers or teaching assistants
• retired, supply or returning teachers

School leaders decided who would be an appropriate tutor with the skills and experience to deliver high-quality tuition to meet the needs of pupils.

Training and quality

To ensure school-led tutoring is high quality, a comprehensive training package was provided by the Education Development Trust. Training was provided free of charge to schools and tutors and took place online.

Data, reporting and accountability

Keeping records of your tutoring

Schools were required to keep up to date, clear and accurate records of the tutoring they delivered. This was used to inform any data returns requested by DfE, including your year-end statement.

We recommended that schools recorded:

• the number of pupils eligible for pupil premium who received tutoring
• the number of other pupils who received tutoring
• how many hours of tutoring you provided to pupils eligible for pupil premium
• how many hours of tutoring you provided to other pupils
• the type of tutoring you provided (whether it was delivered by an employee of the school or a tuition partner)

This helped schools to fulfil data returns when requested by DfE. For the academic year 2023 to 2024, you were asked to provide the following returns: 

• termly school census (October 2023, January 2024, May 2024)
• mandatory year-end statement – available from 2 September 2024 until 5pm 26 September 2024

Mandatory year-end statement

All organisations in receipt of the NTP grant are required to submit a year-end statement to report how they have used their funding.

The form to submit the year-end statement opened on 2 September 2024. It will close at 5pm on 26 September 2024.

Guidance on completing the year-end statement, including a link to the online form, has been published on the National Tutoring Programme (NTP) allocations for 2023 to 2024 academic year page.

We emailed your school at the address you registered on Get Information About Schools on 2 September to notify you that the form was open. You can also get updates by signing up to the NTP newsletter and the ESFA newsletter.

The reporting your tutoring costs section of this guidance has more information about the information we will ask for in the year-end statement.

We will email all grant recipients, including those where no recovery is due, in mid-October 2024 to confirm whether we will recover funding, including the amount we will recover (where applicable).

This decision will be based on the information you provided in your year-end statement.

The email will give you another opportunity to resubmit your year-end statement in November, if you need to do so.

Summary of important dates for academic year 2023 to 2024

2 September to 26 September 2024: submit your year-end statement

Mid-October 2024: recovery emails sent to all grant recipients, including those where no recovery is due

November 2024: opportunity to (re)submit year-end statement, following instructions in the recovery email

Safeguarding

Safeguarding and promoting the welfare of children is everyone’s responsibility.

Schools were responsible for ensuring that appropriate safeguarding and safer recruitment measures were in place for all types of tutoring they delivered.

Tuition partners and safer recruitment

Our delivery partner, Tribal, reviewed each tuition partner’s application of safeguarding and safer recruitment requirements as part of its regular assurance activities. Schools were responsible for their own role in ensuring the safety and wellbeing of  pupils.

Each tuition partner was responsible for recruiting its own tutors, including making decisions on their suitability for employment. If schools engaged a tuition partner to provide tutoring, they must have continued to meet all the requirements set out in keeping children safe in education (KCSIE) to ensure tutors were suitable and the tuition partner had effective safer recruitment arrangements in place.

This included checking the identity of an individual, obtaining as appropriate:

• satisfactory assurances of which pre-recruitment checks have been carried out by the tuition partner in relation to the individual tutor

• a copy of the tutor’s DBS certificate

If a tutor was based overseas, evidence of in-country checks were required to supplement a UK-issued DBS certificate, but must not have been accepted as a substitute.

If the tutor was engaged in the provision of education for children aged 5 or under, your school should have sought additional assurances necessary to satisfy your obligations with respect to childcare disqualification.

KCSIE makes clear that inspectors will always report on whether or not arrangements for safeguarding pupils are effective.

If the tutor was employed by a tuition partner, the organisation was expected to comply with the Conduct of Employment Agencies and Employment Businesses Regulations 2003. These required them to provide schools with confirmation of the identity of the tutor and information about their qualifications and experience, as well as any positive disclosures returned from the safer recruitment checks. They were also required to provide copies of the tutor’s qualifications and references.

Academic mentors, school-led tutors and safer recruitment

Academic mentors and school-led tutors required pre-appointment and safer recruitment checks. Your school must have completed these checks itself, remaining compliant with your school’s obligations under part 3 of KCSIE.

Where an existing member of staff, such as a teacher or teaching assistant, was engaged as a tutor, it remained your school’s responsibility to ensure they were engaged in compliance with all safer recruitment requirements.

Delivery

As with any activity, your school should have considered the risks of tutoring and any appropriate mitigations. For instance, it is good practice for small group and one-to-one tuition to take place in a visible area such as an open-plan workspace, a library, or an information and communication technology suite, where possible.

If tuition was delivered online to pupils who were accessing it from the school site, a staff member should always have been present to supervise given the unique nature of online delivery.

Your school must also have satisfied themselves that appropriate safeguarding arrangements were in place for any online tutoring provided to pupils at home, taking into account your statutory obligations under KCSIE.

Local authorities

Independent special schools

Funding for pupils eligible for pupil premium placed by local authorities in independent special schools (ISSs) was paid directly to the local authority. Local authorities were allowed to retain this funding to organise tutoring for these pupils themselves, or pass on NTP funding to applicable ISSs to enable them to provide tutoring for eligible pupils.

Funding should not have been passed on to non-maintained special schools, maintained special schools or special academies, as these received their own NTP allocations.

When transferring NTP funding to ISSs, local authorities were expected to:

• identify pupils eligible for pupil premium placed by them in ISSs
• inform the ISS who the pupils eligible for pupil premium were when passing on the funding and that this funding was ring fenced for tutoring
• pass on the payment as promptly as possible, ideally in one instalment

Local authorities will need to include information about the tutoring delivered by ISSs in their year-end statement. This will include:

• the names of all ISSs they have transferred NTP funding to and the amount transferred to each ISS
• the total hours of tutoring delivered by ISSs they transferred NTP funding to

Local authorities will also need to report on any NTP funding spent centrally in their year-end statement. This will include the:

• total amount spent on tutoring
• total number of hours delivered
• total number of pupils tutored

The ISS should have decided how best to use the funding to provide tuition support for pupils, in line with the guidance provided.

It was the responsibility of the ISS to work with local authorities, where necessary, to decide which pupils eligible for pupil premium needed support and what constituted a suitable tutoring offer for those pupils.

ISSs do not need to complete a year-end statement, but should have informed local authorities how many hours of tuition they delivered using the grant.

Virtual school heads

Funding for looked-after children was paid directly to the local authority. We expected local authorities to pass the NTP funding for looked-after children to their virtual school head.

The virtual school head should have decided how best to use the funding to provide tuition support for the pupils they are responsible for, working with relevant schools as necessary.

It was the responsibility of the virtual school head to:

• decide which looked-after children to support, how many hours tuition they should receive, and in which subjects - we expected that this was decided in close co-operation with appropriate schools, as necessary
• have complied with the data collection requirements by completing the mandatory year-end statement
• have paid for tuition costs that are not covered by the 50% NTP subsidy
• have noted whether your allocation is for mainstream, SEND or both, and kept separate records for each

We understand that, in some cases, virtual school heads wanted the flexibility to pass on funding directly to the relevant schools, who could arrange the tuition provision locally.

Schools may also have chosen to provide NTP tuition for looked-after children, using the funding provided. In such cases, it is important to remember that the virtual school head still needed to fulfil the responsibilities outlined.

All local authorities, through their virtual school heads, will be required to complete and return their year-end statement, detailing how much tuition has been delivered to their pupils using the NTP funding provided to them and the virtual school head’s contribution.

Contact us

If you have any general queries about NTP, or would like support to decide which tutoring route will meet your school’s needs, you can contact us by:

• email: tutoring.support@service.education.gov.uk
• phone: 0300 373 0891 (8.30am to 5pm, Monday to Friday)