Official development assistance (ODA): DfE spending statement
Published 17 April 2020
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DfE funding in relation to ODA
ODA is defined as resource flows to developing countries and multilateral organisations, which are provided by official agencies, like the UK government, or their executive agencies.
DfE calculates its ODA spending using the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) definition of ODA.
This principally relates to education spend on asylum seeker applicant children for the first 12 months after their asylum application is lodged who are either eligible for early years funding or are of primary and secondary school age.
When producing its ODA spending figure, DfE estimates how much of the general revenue funding relates to asylum seeker applicant children who are attending a school or an early years setting.
DfE funding policy for asylum seeking children
DfE does not have a separate funding stream for educating asylum seeker children. It is our policy that asylum seeker children who attend a school or early years setting attract funding in the same way as all other children. This is allocated through the schools national funding formula and other grants like the pupil premium and teachers’ pay grant.
This approach ensures that asylum seeker children attract the same basic per pupil funding amount as other children and any additional funding related to asylum seeking children’s specific needs and characteristics, like:
- pupils eligible for free school meals
- pupils with English as an additional language
- socio-economic deprivation
More information
The Department for International Development (DfID) has included estimates for the DfE’s contribution to UK ODA in its statistics on international development since 2015.
There’s separate information, published by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), about the official development assistance strategy since 2015.