Pupils educated other than at school: September 2020 to August 2021

These statistics are about Pupils Educated Other than at School (EOTAS pupils) who are funded by a local authority. The data from the 2020/21 academic year (September 2020 to July 2021) are based on information on pupils who local authorities know are receiving some education outside of school during the week of 19 to 23 April 2021.

In this data, there are pupils whose main education is outside of school. This means that the majority of their education time in a week is delivered outside of a school, e.g. in a Pupil Referral Unit or Elective Home Education.

Main points

• 2,186 EOTAS pupils were recorded, with 1,792 of these receiving their main education outside of school.
• 3.8 out of every 1,000 pupils were receiving their main education outside of school. This is the highest rate since the 2011/12 academic year, where the rate was 2.2 out of every 1,000 pupils.
• 7 out of 10 pupils whose main education is other than at school were boys.
• Pupil Referral Units remain the most frequently-used education provision for pupils whose main education is other than at school. 45.9% of enrolments for these pupils were in Pupil Referral Units.
• Just under 9 out of every 10 pupils whose main education is other than at school had some SEN (Special Educational Need) provision.
• 40% of pupils educated other than at school were entitled to free school meals (FSM).
• 10.4 out of every 1,000 pupils aged 5 to 15 were reported to be electively home educated. This is the highest rate since the 2011/12 academic year, following a steady increase since then. In 2011/12 2.7 out of every 1,000 pupils aged 5 to 15 were reported to be electively home educated.

Note on quality of data

This report covers a time period within the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic. The most recent data in this report relates to the situation as at April 2021. The census would usually take place in January. However, the national lockdown between December 2020 and March 2021 due to the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic meant that the census date was delayed to 20 April 2021.

The Welsh Government works closely with local authorities in order to ensure all data are validated before tables are published.  Data are collated into an electronic return and submitted to the Welsh Government through DEWi, a secure online data transfer system developed by the Welsh Government. Various stages of automated validation and sense-checking are built into the process to ensure a high quality of data.

Please see the quality report for further information.