Schools Week recently had a very interesting article about a shortage of places in the state-funded alternative provision (AP) sector[1].
This was somewhat surprising given the most recent figures for the number of pupils on roll in the sector.
In January 2023, published DfE statistics show that there were 13,191 pupils on roll in 335 AP schools. However, this was somewhat lower than the 16,134 on roll in January 2019.
So why are AP schools so full?
I’ll be honest: I can’t answer this. But what I do want to show is that the published statistics on pupil numbers in AP schools under-report the true number.
