Disadvantage and Inclusion

Our first charitable objective is to focus on delivering the benefits of learning chess to “those who are socially and economically disadvantaged”. When we work in the community, our activities are open to all and always free at the point of delivery. In our Schools Programme, the model of delivery is designed to ensure we reach all pupils, with a focus on under represented groups.

Delivery model

By running lessons in curriculum time, we ensure that all children have full access to the social and economic benefits of learning chess. Chess clubs are often male dominated; in our lessons, girls’ attainment is at least as high as boys’. Children with special educational needs tend to flourish in our classrooms. While schools usually charge parents for extra curricular activities, we ask all our schools to ensure that no child is excluded from a CSC-run chess club because their parents are unable to afford the fee.

Disadvantaged families

A key metric for measuring the inclusivity of our programme is the number of children we reach who are in receipt of Pupil Premium funding. We focus our efforts on geographic areas in the top quartile of socio-economic deprivation, and on schools within those areas with high proportions of Pupil Premium children.

Concentration on inner cities

Large urban conurbations invariably exhibit higher levels of socio-economic deprivation. Over three-quarters of our schools in England lie in one of the following urban areas: London, Liverpool, Manchester, Birmingham, Bristol, Teesside, Leeds.  CSC is particularly active in Middlesbrough where three of our schools have Pupil Premium numbers significantly more than twice the national average.

Focus on Pupil Premium

Within a given urban area, we concentrate on schools with high proportions of Pupil Premium children. Roughly 60% of our schools in London are in the ten boroughs (out of 33) with the highest levels of such children. This includes one school in Camden where 94% of all children receive Pupil Premium funding. Many of our schools in the capital receive Pupil Premium for of the children on their roll. In Hackney, for example, we work with Hoxton Garden Primary School (54%), Thomas Fairchild Primary School (53.2%) and Orchard Primary (49.2%). CSC was established in east London and boroughs in that part of the capital remain a particular focus (Newham, Hackney, Tower Hamlets). Many of the schools in these areas exhibit particularly high levels of Pupil Premium children.