Page 4 - Who is losing learning IPPR Briefing & Podcast March 2025

2. Disproportionate Impact on Vulnerable Children:

•Socioeconomic Disadvantage: Children growing up in poverty are significantly more likely to
experience lost learning. Those eligible for free school meals (FSM) have twice as high behaviour points
and are nearly five times more likely to be permanently excluded.

•Contact with Social Services: Children on child protection plans (CPP) face alarmingly high rates of
permanent exclusion (eight times the national rate) and severe absence (over five times the national
rate). Children in need (CIN) also show significantly higher rates of permanent exclusion.

•Special Educational Needs (SEN): Children with SEN, particularly those without an Education, Health
and Care Plan (EHCP), receive twice as many behaviour points and are over five times more likely to be
permanently excluded than their non-SEN peers. Even those with SEN support show significantly
increased likelihood of exclusion and absence.

•Ethnicity: Certain ethnic groups, including Black Caribbean, Romani (Gypsy) and Roma, and Irish
Traveller children, are significantly overrepresented in suspension and alternative provision figures.

•Gender: Boys are twice as likely to be permanently excluded as girls, potentially linked to differences in
how mental ill-health symptoms present ("externalising" vs. "internalising").

Quotes:

•"Children growing up in poverty: Have behaviour points which are twice as high as their peers – one of
the early signs of struggle. Those eligible for free school meals were nearly five times more likely to be

permanently excluded than their non eligible peers in 2022/23.“

•"Children in contact with social services: children on child protection plans are permanently excluded at
eight times, and severely absent from school at over five times, the national rate.“

•"Children with special educational needs: Children with special educational needs receive, on average,
twice as many behaviour points as their peers... Those with special educational needs, but without an
education, health and care plan (EHCP), are over five times more likely to be permanently excluded than
their non SEN peers."