Recommendation 21

The Department told us of a number of ways it had been sharing best practice on the National Tutoring Programme. These included offering direct support to schools and having webinars and shared promotions and research. It highlighted in particular research by the Education Endowment Foundation and the National Foundation for Educational Research that had embedded guidance in schools to support effective tutoring.42 The Department also noted that some 70% of school leaders were following Education Endowment Foundation evidence in using their recovery premium funding. It described that evidence as the “gold standard”.43 We asked the Department what lessons it had learned from the first two years that it would apply to the next two years. It told us that the most important was the power of data to target the pupils and places that 35 C&AG’s Report, Key facts 36 C&AG’s Report, para 12 37 Qq 48, 75, 76 38 Qq 47, 48 39 C&AG’s Report, para 2.27 40 Q 92 41 Q 92 42 Q 45 43 Q 83 12 Education recovery in schools in England need it most. The Department added that there was continuing evaluation of the National Tutoring Programme to ensure tutoring was delivering the best value for money, and that it had committed to investigate how it could further develop longitudinal studies.44 Withdrawal of the Department’s subsidy for tutoring