Guidance

Guidance for completing and returning the 14 to 16-year-old pupil premium and free school meals form for the 2026 to 2027 academic year

Updated 2 November 2026

Applies to England

Introduction 

This guidance helps you complete the form for pupil premium and free school meals for 14- to 16-year-olds. 

Use this form to report the number of 14- to 16-year-old students in your institution who are eligible for free meals, pupil premium and service pupil premium in the 2026 to 2027 academic year. 

Further education and sixth-form colleges can enrol students aged 14 to 16 on a full-time study programme and receive funding from the Department for Education (DfE). Such programmes include the study of technical qualifications, alongside general qualifications, including English and mathematics, within the key stage 4 curriculum. 

For the purpose of this guidance, references to colleges do not include academies for 16- to 19-year-olds, as these are outside the scope of this provision. 

More information on pupil premium for 14- to 16-year-olds is detailed in the guidance on  full-time enrolment of 14- to 16-year-olds in further education and sixth-form colleges. 

Who this publication is for

The guidance is for further education and sixth-form colleges. 

When to complete your submission  

The deadline to complete and submit your form is 5pm on 20 November 2026.

Accessing the form

Access the free meals and pupil premium digital form to complete your return.  

Before you start  

Make sure you have: 

• read this guidance

• a DfE Sign-in account 

• the total of 14- to 16-year-old students enrolled by your institution on or before 1 November 2026 

• the number of 14- to 16-year-old students who are eligible for pupil premium, free school meals, the service premium or are care leavers

DfE Sign-in 

Sign in to  your DfE Sign-in account 

To access the form through your DfE Sign-in account: 

1. Go to the digital form and select ‘Start now’. When prompted, enter your DfE Sign-in credentials (your account email address and password) for authentication.

2. If a multi-factor authentication (MFA) is enabled on your account, you’ll need to enter a verification code to sign in. To receive the verification email with the code, you need to click on ‘Email code to [your email address]’ on the ‘Verify your identity page’ you were directed to after entering your email and password.  

3. After clicking on ‘Email code to [your email address]’, you’ll progress to the next page, ‘Enter code’. Copy the code from the verification email and paste it into the box. Then select ‘Verify’.

4. Choose the organisation for which you are completing the form – this is only required if your account is linked to several organisations.  

5. The next page will display the details we hold about the organisation you selected when you signed in. This will show the name, address and unique reference number (URN) or UK provider reference number (UKPRN) of the organisation, as well as the name and email address of the person who signed into the form. 

6. If these details are correct, select ‘Continue’ to go to the next page.

7. If these details are incorrect, contact us through our customer help portal and we will investigate. You can still proceed with your submission.

To complete the form, your DfE Sign-in account must be connected to the organisation for which you are completing the form. You do not need to add any services in DfE Sign-in – it is used only  for authentication. 

If you do not have a DfE Sign-in account  

If you do not have a DfE Sign-in account, you will need to create one by completing the following steps:

1. Access the DfE Sign-in page and select ‘create a DfE Sign-in account’.

2. Enter your email address. You must use a valid business email address that contains your name – we are unable to accept generic emails, such as ‘admin’ or ‘info’. You cannot use a personal email address.

3. We will send you an email to verify your email address. Copy the code from this email and paste it into the box on the verification page.

4. Create a memorable password of 8 characters that contains 3 out of the following: lowercase characters, uppercase characters, numbers and symbols. Enter your given name and surname. 

5. Sign in using your new credentials. Request your MFA verification email by clicking on ‘Email code to [your email address]’ on the ‘Verify your identity page’. 

6. We will send you an MFA email to verify your identity. Copy the code from this email and paste it into the box on the verification page. 

7. Follow the next-step instructions set out in ‘Adding an organisation to your DfE Sign-in account’ in the next section.

Adding an organisation to your DfE Sign-in account 

To add a new organisation to your DfE Sign-in account, complete the following steps:

1. Sign in to your DfE Sign-in account. 

2. Select ‘Organisations’ from the tab at the top of the page.

3. Select ‘Request access to an organisation’ from the ‘Related actions’ on the right-hand side of the page. 

4. Enter the URN or UKPRN of the organisation you wish to add. 

5. Select the organisation from search results.

6. Select ‘Confirm’. 

Your request will be sent to an approver within your organisation. If you do not already have an approver, your request will be actioned by the DfE Sign-in support team. 

Once your request to access an organisation has been approved, you can follow the steps set out in the Sign in to your DfE Sign-in account section to complete the form.

You may have noticed the term ‘approver’ when setting up your account. An approver is someone at your organisation responsible for controlling who has access to DfE Sign-in and the services within the system. It is usually an administrator or a senior manager. 

For security reasons, you will need the authorisation of one of your organisation’s approvers before you can access the form.

 If you need further assistance 

For problems using the DfE Sign-in service, use our DfE Sign-in help service to request assistance. When raising a support request, select ‘Other’.  

If you are having problems accessing the form, contact us through our customer help portal. 

Completing the form  

 Access the 14 to 16 free meals and pupil premium digital form and select ‘Start now’. Once you have been authenticated through DfE Sign-in, you will find a ‘Save and continue’ button on each page of the form. If you sign out or leave the form opened for an extended period before submitting, you can resume your submission when you sign back in.

Once you have submitted your form, you will be advised of the next steps and will receive an email confirmation of your submission with a link to download a PDF copy of it. This link will expire after 6 months, so we recommend you download a copy as soon as possible.

You can edit and resubmit your form until the submission deadline.   

Selecting ‘Save and continue’ on each page will take you through the form. You must click ‘Submit’ on the final form page to send your completed data return to us.

 Your details 

We will show you the information we hold about the organisation you selected when you signed into your DfE Sign-in account.

Total students 

14- to 16-year-old students are defined as those who were aged 14 or 15 on 31 August 2026 and are enrolled at the college directly on or before 1 November 2026. This is the R04 reference date.

This will not include 14- to 16-year-olds enrolled at a school or other institution studying at the college for some of their provision, nor will it include 14- to 16-year-olds who have achieved a level 2 qualification and have chosen to enrol on a level 3 programme. 

Free school meals students 

This includes those students recorded in the October 2025 school census who are known to have been eligible for free school meals since May 2020 (known as ‘ever 6’).  This also includes those first known to be eligible as at October 2025.

Care leaver students 

This includes students recorded in the January 2025 school census and alternative provision census who were looked after by an English or Welsh local authority immediately before being adopted. 

This also includes students who left local authority care on a special guardianship order or child arrangements order (previously known as a residence order). 

Pupil premium students 

Students who are eligible for pupil premium are: 

• entitled to free school meals – this will include those students recorded in the October 2025 school census who are known to have been eligible for free school meals since May 2020, as well as those first known to be eligible as of October 2025

• no longer eligible for free school meals but have claimed free school meals during the past 6 years (known as ‘ever 6’) 

• in care, or have left care through adoption or other formal legal routes such as a child arrangements or special guardianship order

If a student is eligible under more than one category, they must be counted only once. 

Your answer must be less than or equal to the total of free school meal and care leaver students provided. 

Service premium students 

Students eligible for the service premium are those who were recorded in the October 2025 school census and have been eligible for the service child premium since the January 2020 school census. 

Those students recorded as a service child for the first time on the October 2025 census should also be counted. 

Institutions should also include any student whose parent has died in service, if they are now in receipt of pensions under the Armed Forces Compensation Scheme (AFCS) or the War Pensions Scheme (WPS). 

Declarations page 

Once you have completed all relevant data entries, you must complete all mandatory declarations. You will not be able to submit your form without fully completing this section. You will need to tick each statement box to confirm your agreement. 

Submission summary 

The summary page allows you to check your answers before submitting your form.    

You can edit your answers using the ‘Change’ link that appears next to each data entry. 

You can download the summary by selecting ‘Save summary as PDF’ before you submit.  

You must select ‘Submit’ at the bottom of this page so your submission is processed. 

 Confirmation  

The final page confirms your form has been successfully submitted. You will receive a reference number for your submission, followed by an explanation of what happens next. 

You will also receive an email confirming successful submission. This email will contain a link to download a PDF copy of your submission, which is valid for 6 months from the date of your submission. 

It is important that you make a note of your reference number, as we will not include this information in your confirmation email. 

 Amending your submission 

You can make changes to the form and resubmit it until 5pm on 20 November 2026. To do this, you will need to sign back in to access your form, make your amendments and resubmit it. 

You will be unable to amend your data after the submission deadline. All previous versions will be disregarded. 

You will receive a new reference number for an amended submission. 

Enquiries  

If you have read this guidance and have any questions, contact us through our customer help portal. 

Feedback 

We are committed to enhancing our user experience and improving our digital forms. We therefore welcome and encourage user feedback.