Education spending across the life cycle in England

On 27 February 2017 from 10:00 to 12:00

Broadway House

<p>Tothill Street, London, SW1H 9NQ</p>

IFS researchers have produced a new report funded by the Nuffield Foundation that provides consistent measures of day-to-day spending per pupil in England across the four main stages of education (early years, schools, further education and sixth forms, and higher education) stretching back to the early 1990s.

Over the last 25 years, there have been significant changes to the level and structure of education spending in England. At the same time, there have also been substantial changes in the number of young people participating in each stage of education over time. How have these changes affected the balance of spending per pupil across the different phases of education over time? How will plans for further reform affect this pattern going forwards? Such questions are a vital component of the education policy debate, particularly given the work by James Heckman and others emphasising the differential effectiveness of resources at different stages of the life course.

To inform such debates, IFS researchers have produced a new report funded by the Nuffield Foundation that provides consistent measures of day-to-day spending per pupil in England across the four main stages of education (early years, schools, further education and sixth forms, and higher education) stretching back to the early 1990s. This will provide policymakers and the public with a much longer and more comprehensive picture of how spending per student has been evolving across different stages of education than has previously been available.

At this event, IFS researchers presented key findings from this new report, focusing on issues such as:

How has spending on the entitlement to free early education and childcare provision changed over time?
How has school spending per pupil changed over time and what challenges face the school sector over the coming years?
How has spending on further education and sixth form colleges fared as numbers of students have risen and policymakers have focused extra spending on other areas of education?
How have public resources going into Higher Education in England changed following successive reforms to higher education funding?

Following presentations by the researchers, there was also a panel discussion by experts and stakeholders, including: