Debate contribution: RAISE: Failure to Tackle Educational Underachievement

Debate contribution by Mr Paul Givan on 5 November 2024.

MLA

Mr Paul Givan

Party at the time

Democratic Unionist Party

Date

5 November 2024

Type

Debate contribution (made as a minister)

Business

Private Members' Business

Heading

RAISE: Failure to Tackle Educational Underachievement

Assembly identifier

Official Report component 4631640

Read the official Assembly record

Text

Thank you. In any other forum at any other time, I would have thought it uncontentious to say that the best way to tackle educational underachievement is to tackle educational underachievement. Not so in this House, it seems. Instead, there is much focus on hyperbole and unfounded assertions. When we have objective educational data, I do not really understand why that is the case. The United States congressman Daniel Patrick Moynihan once reflected:

"You are entitled to your opinion. But you are not entitled to your own facts."

That seems appropriate to the premise of the motion. Prejudice is, of course, a great timesaver. You can form opinions without having to get to the facts. I am happy to debate the constraining opinions, although I find it unproductive to debate facts. The House must ask itself this: should the RAISE programme simply and exactly replicate the £80 million of annual funding already allocated to tackle social disadvantage in schools through the common funding scheme and other programmes or should it seek to support communities across Northern Ireland, ensuring a regional spread and directly targeting children living in areas where educational outcomes are lowest? The motion suggests that socio-economic background is the biggest predictor of educational underachievement. The evidence across the world, of course, shows a close link between social disadvantage and low educational achievement. That is why significant funding is already targeted by my Department to tackle social disadvantage. The independent review of education, based on a thorough review of the evidence, was very clear. Large numbers of schools with a high level of disadvantage in Northern Ireland are performing well above expectations in GCSE and A-level outcomes. It concluded:

"Both excellence and underachievement are to be found in schools with intakes at all levels of socio-economic disadvantage."

It is not alone in that conclusion. In a major international study, the programme for international student assessment (PISA) tells a similar story, concluding that the gap in achievement between pupils from the most advantaged backgrounds in Northern Ireland and those from less socio-economic advantaged homes was significantly smaller than the average across OECD countries. In this context, therefore, is not the best assessment of educational underachievement found by looking at actual evidence of educational underachievement? Ideally, we would look at this across assessment at Key Stages 1, 2 and 3 as well as GCSE. Unfortunately, in recent years, we only have data at GCSE level. Members know the reason why. In recent weeks, I have reminded schools that there is a statutory requirement that they provide such information at Key Stages 1, 2 and 3. To be clear, that is not my requirement but a requirement set out in law, potentially enforceable by the courts. We do have GCSE and A-level results to enable us to analyse educational performance. Should we not use this data to target the areas with the lowest outcomes? Is this not entirely objective and sensible? Higher levels of qualification are strongly associated with better prospects in the labour market and in lifetime earnings. Individuals achieving five or more good GCSEs, including English and maths, as their highest qualification are estimated to have lifetime productivity gains worth around £100,000 on average compared with those of lower or no qualifications. Are interventions not needed to tackle directly poor educational attainment? I remind the House too that free school meal entitlement is simply a proxy for socio-economic disadvantage, and, like all proxy measures, as every Member who has spoken about free school meals has said, it is not perfect. Socio-economic disadvantage is a complex, multifaceted concept. Free school meal entitlement is tied to only one domain, which is household income. It is based on benefit claims, so children from families that narrowly miss the cut-off point for receiving benefits — the working poor — may experience similar or greater levels of deprivation than some children who are receiving free school meals. In addition, many eligible families do not apply for them and therefore may be missing from the estimates. The RAISE programme is designed to use wide-ranging measures of socio-economic disadvantage to identify eligible areas and then pinpoint investment using educational attainment data. Returning to RAISE itself, let us focus on the facts, because, after all, facts are far more stubborn than I can be. Fact one: RAISE is a community-informed education programme, not a school-based programme. It therefore targets areas, not schools. It aims to promote a whole-community approach to education through place-based partnerships. It will fund interventions to improve educational outcomes for children and young people living in areas of disadvantage through joint working across communities, schools, government and the community and voluntary sector. It is not more of the same or simply meant to replicate the £80 million a year directed at schools to tackle socio-economic disadvantage. Rather, the programme was explicitly designed to take a place-based approach to education, the need for which was highlighted by the 'A Fair Start' report panel. Fact two: the criteria to select the RAISE localities were data-informed, with all areas having to meet a threshold of need, evidenced by factors such as free school meal entitlement, educational outcomes and special educational needs.

Fact three: no funding has yet been allocated to any school or community partner through RAISE. Any commentary that schools have got funding — I have heard it from some Members in the Chamber today — is wrong. Moreover, any commentary that schools will be receiving funding is completely inaccurate and premature. Fact four: a period of co-design is under way in advance of any funding decisions. Locality reference groups will be established in each of the RAISE areas. Each group will listen, discuss, reflect and reach consensus on a strategic plan for the area. Ultimately, my Department will fund local plans that identify the need for investment, that develop evidence-based interventions, that design a collaborative approach to delivery and that clearly measure impact. The Committee Chairman wanted to make an intervention.

The Member excluded to mention that some Members used the publication of the list to exploit a particular approach that they take to education. I have heard it today, with a particular focus on grammar schools. Publishing it certainly gave some Members an opportunity to exploit the list to make a particular point. I have addressed the issue of the publication of the list. I have said today that no school has received funding. Not one school has received any funding. Ms Hunter referred to taking money off the poor to give to the wealthy, but that is wrong. Mr Carroll referenced schools that had received funding in my constituency, but that is also wrong. They will not correct the record, I am sure, but facts are not debatable. Members are entitled to their opinion, but the facts speak for themselves.

I may give way when I make some progress. In the current extremely challenging financial climate, as Mr Sheehan rightly recognised, I am delighted to have secured £20 million of additional investment for communities in Northern Ireland through the Shared Island Fund. Much has been made of the selection methodology for the programme. As I have said, the approach that my Department took was data-led. It is robust and was objectively designed and delivered. There were three key elements to the methodology. First, the aim is to have a regional programme and therefore invest in communities right across Northern Ireland. It is important that RAISE extend beyond the reach of Belfast and Londonderry in order to ensure that children in rural and coastal areas, who are also facing poverty and educational disadvantage, receive the support that they deserve. Members have highlighted some areas that are not included. I would love to have included every part of Northern Ireland, but £20 million is £20 million, and we therefore have to have criteria and a methodology for the scheme. Due to population size and level of disadvantage, however, I assure Members who represent Belfast and Londonderry that they will remain the most significant beneficiaries of the RAISE programme. Thirty-nine per cent of pupils identified by RAISE come from those two areas, despite their representing only 26% of Northern Ireland's population, yet it is vital that we address the massive challenges faced by some smaller, remoter parts of the country. Persistent patterns of rural underperformance have been overlooked. Secondly, the programme used a broad range of indicators to identify localities that are experiencing high levels of educational underachievement. Superoutput areas across Northern Ireland were analysed using seven criteria. Free school meals was supplemented by measures of special educational needs, pupil attendance and GCSE achievement, as well as the Northern Ireland multiple deprivation measures of income, health deprivation and crime and antisocial behaviour. Those seven criteria were informed by discussions with a stakeholder reference group that was put in place to support delivery of the 'A Fair Start' actions.

Whilst free school meals is an important indicator and was included, I make no apology for also wanting to examine indicators of health, crime and economic inactivity. Those are key factors in educational disadvantage. Thirdly, the programme prioritised investment in the areas with lowest levels of attainment. Using the seven criteria created a shortlist of 256 eligible superoutput areas, with areas that had lower levels of attainment at GCSE then prioritised for investment. As the Minister of Education, I want all children and young people to reach their potential. Ultimately, the success of this programme will be determined by how well it improves educational outcomes, so it is absolutely right that I invest in the areas with the lowest levels of attainment. I therefore absolutely refute the assertion in the motion that the data is not objective. The RAISE programme targets children, not institutions. It directly targets investment at areas where there are too many children who leave after 12 years of schooling without the basic skills that are needed to succeed in life. In conclusion —

— I emphasise that the RAISE programme is a new approach. It is a programme that goes beyond the school gate. It aims to complement existing interventions and invest in communities that have the highest levels of educational underachievement. It is focused on improving outcomes, directly targeting investment where attainment is lowest. We are not using the single dataset of free school meal entitlement. I ask the House this: do we not need to tackle educational inequality by pooling resources, using evidence-based approaches and testing new ways of unlocking the barriers that hold young people back in the areas where the educational challenges are greatest? I assure Members that the data behind RAISE is extremely robust, that it is evidence-informed and data-led and that it targets children based on evidence of deprivation and low achievement, because both are essential.

1,797 words. Text as published by the Northern Ireland Assembly.

Assessment

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Assessed 21 October 2026 at 11:30 UTC by jev-1.13.0 (requested as typesafe/jev) under rubric 2026.10-r9, methodology 1.9.

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