The UK Education Endowment Foundation announces an online tuition pilot addressing 1600  pupils from disadvantaged communities, trying to establish if high-quality tuition is effective to mitigate the potentially devastating effect of schools closure on the poorest children and young people. The pilot will be independently evaluated by NatCen.

The launch of this online tuition pilot comes right after the publication by the same foundation of a detailed analysis of the likely impact of school closures on the attainment gap (see Best evidence on impact of school closures on the attainment gap). Among many other considerations, the paper reports that “Following a rapid evidence review looking at the impact on the attainment gap as a result of different kinds of school closures (eg, summer holidays, adverse weather, natural disasters) it concludes that school closures as a result of Covid-19 will widen the attainment gap between disadvantaged children and their peers, likely reversing the progress made since 2011.“

For more information, please visit the dedicated article on the EFF’s official website here.