Young people living in disadvantaged communities in Yorkshire are facing challenges on a number of fronts, not least of all in the classroom.With a greater proportion of pupils in the North affected by poverty, the regional gap between North and South has widened too. Research shows that the pandemic hit poorer children hardest, and that they are facing challenges to their mental health and learning. Those factors, combined with an unprecedented cost-of-living crisis, mean young people in our Northern cities are facing greater challenges in trying to achieve their potential.

While the disruption caused by Covid-19 has receded somewhat, national data from Year 6 SATs has bolstered other evidence that the gap between ‘disadvantaged’ pupils (those entitled to Pupil Premium funding) and their peers widened over the pandemic, with only 42 per cent of disadvantaged pupils meeting the expected standard in reading, writing and maths, compared with 65 per cent of other pupils. GCSE data confirmed that the attainment gap at age 16 between disadvantaged pupils and their peers had risen to the highest level since 2012. There is real inequity between the haves and have nots.

Tutor Trust was founded as a charity in 2011 as a response to inequity in schools. Twelve years on, we have successful results from two Education Endowment Foundation-led Randomised Control Trials (RCT) to our name (making us unique in the UK Education sector). All the evidence is pointing to the fact that tuition works in raising pupils’ attainment – and, in the aftermath of the pandemic, it’s needed now more than ever.

From our own research, and feedback from the young people we support, tuition can have a profound and positive impact. Working in small groups of just three pupils – and sometimes one-to-one support for those children who are cared for, or who face additional barriers to learning – tuition is tailored to the individual pupil, their interests and hobbies. The Year 11 pupils we supported last year, and who sat their GCSEs in summer, outperformed their peers both locally and nationally.

The results of our first RCT showed how 12 hours of tutoring resulted in three months of attainment in Maths. This is why we run tuition programmes over 15 one-hour weekly sessions (so that, allowing for illness or absence, pupils get a minimum of 12 hours). Our second RCT, the ‘Snap Survey’, showed the importance of the connection between tutors and tutees in driving attendance, and therefore attainment, and our tutors now use this as a tool at the start of every new programme.

Our tuition model focuses on making tuition accessible, and free of charge, to those young people living in the most socio-economically challenged communities, by partnering with their schools.

And tuition doesn’t just support the academic aspect of learning. It also serves to boost pupils’ self-confidence, and this benefit frequently spills over into other areas of their lives.

We want to continue tutoring young people in Yorkshire so that we can have a long-lasting impact on their learning and will continue to work with schools to make this happen, even when their budgets are squeezed by the cost-of-living crisis.

We are continuing to lobby the DfE to embed tutoring sustainably within the school system – and fund it.

Ed Marsh is CEO of charity Tutor Trust.

The pandemic hit poorer children hardest leaving them facing greater challenges - Ed Marsh