Behaviour Improvement Programme

What is the Behaviour Improvement Programme?

The BiP is aimed at improving poor behaviour and attendance in schools where these issues form significant barriers to learning and pupil progress. Supported locally by Local Authorities and managed locally by the Excellence Cluster Partnerships, BiPs target resources at a small number of schools with the greatest behaviour and attendance challenges across the Primary and Secondary sectors within the Excellence Clusters.

The Rationale for the Programme

The BiP is one of the central elements of the Government's strategy to improve behaviour and attendance in schools and is an integral part of the drive to raise standards. It is also intended to contribute to the Government's strategy to reduce street crime.

The programme is designed to tackle a number of long standing concerns including:

Levels of pupils' unauthorised absence remaining unchanged
Poor standards of behaviour in some schools
The impact of poor behaviour on all pupils affected by it and their attainment
The amount of school management time taken up dealing with behaviour
The negative impact of pupil behaviour on recruitment and retention, especially newly qualified staff
The correlation between poor attendance and behaviour by pupils and their subsequent life chances, especially those excluded from school

The key objectives for BiP are:

Reduce low level behavioural problems
Reduce bullying
Reduce the number of incidents of extreme behaviour
Reduce the number of fixed term and permanent exclusions
Ensure high quality provision for those excluded, supporting their reintegration
Reduce unauthorised absence
Improve parents and teachers' perceptions of behaviou
Close the gap between behaviour problems shown by different groups of pupils