How learning beyond the classroom can help schools deliver a broad, inclusive and impactful enrichment offer.
The Department for Education has published its Enrichment Framework and Enrichment Benchmarks, giving schools and colleges in England a structure for planning and delivering enrichment.
What exactly is the Enrichment Framework?
This non-statutory guidance from the Department for Education published in June 2026 is designed to help schools and colleges in England plan, evaluate and strengthen enrichment and personal development activities for all pupils.
The framework is built around five core categories of activities and eight key benchmarks to ensure all young people – especially disadvantaged pupils – gain access to well-rounded experiences.
The five Enrichment categories
Enrichment activities should span these five main areas:
- Civic engagement
- Arts and culture
- Nature, outdoors and adventure
- Sport and physical activity
- Wider life and future skills
The eight Enrichment Benchmarks
The benchmarks are designed to help schools take a more structured approach to enrichment and focus on evidencing their work to ensure that every young person, including the most disadvantaged, can access a broad range of experiences that support their personal development, wellbeing and future success.
- A strategically aligned enrichment offer
- A broad and well-rounded enrichment offer
- A well-communicated enrichment offer that celebrates participation and achievement
- An enrichment offer shaped by the school or college community
- An accessible and engaging enrichment offer
- An enrichment offer that works in partnership (with external organizations and local groups)
- An outcomes-focused enrichment offer
- A continually improving enrichment offer.
Learning beyond the classroom is enrichment in action
The diagram below shows that learning beyond the classroom spans every one of the framework’s five areas of enrichment.
Whether these experiences happen during the school day or beyond, are teacher or third party led, and are planned to support extra-curricular or co-curricular activities, they are currently – and will remain – assessed as enrichment.
Schools don’t need to start from scratch
Whether through day visits, residentials, cultural experiences, environmental projects, employer engagement, volunteering or community-based learning, or clubs and societies, schools can feel reassured that they are already using learning beyond the classroom to deliver exactly the kind of beneficial enrichment this framework is asking for. For most schools, the real challenge is bringing these opportunities together into a whole-school programme: strategically planned, well-evidenced, and embedded in school culture and policy so it is sustained, and genuinely inclusive and accessible to every child.
Supporting schools to succeed
Our Learning Beyond programme offers different levels of support to meet the needs of individual schools. We’ve also carried out an initial mapping exercise and found that our existing frameworks align closely — around 90% — with the new government benchmarks.
There are free resources to help schools get going, including self-assessment audit tools and ‘how to’ guides.
As part of the LOtC Mark, an award that recognises and celebrates progress, schools can access online CPD and case studies, a bespoke online progress tracker, and advice and templates to help evidence enrichment activity, there’s even support from a mentor from another school.
Whether schools are just starting out or looking to develop further, there’s a set of tried-and-tested tools, resources and guidance already in place that align tightly to the new Enrichment Framework and Benchmarks.
For almost twenty years, CLOtC has supported schools across the country to develop their learning beyond the classroom and improve outcomes for children and young people. That track record is exactly why our approach works: tested and refined with the schools we support and proven by their continued success.
Going for gold: Meridian Trust
Our work with the Meridian Trust is an outstanding example of what can be achieved with the right support and a consistent, trust-wide approach. Twenty-five schools within the multi-academy trust were awarded the LOtC Mark last year and all thirty-six schools are on track to achieve the award by next year.
The LOtC Mark has provided Meridian Trust with far more than an award — it has given us a clear framework to help organise, evaluate and strengthen the enrichment opportunities already taking place across our schools. As conversations around enrichment entitlement continue to develop nationally, schools should feel reassured that they are already delivering many of these experiences. The LOtC Mark helps schools bring this together in a structured and strategic way, providing practical guidance, quality assurance and professional support to help develop provision further.
The Meridian Trust is leading the way nationally by embedding learning outside the classroom (LOtC) across all of its schools as part of a whole-trust approach to education. Guided by its core value of “Extending the Boundaries of Learning”, the Trust has made learning beyond the classroom an integral part of curriculum design, school culture and student experience.
We wholeheartedly welcome this bold, once-in-a-generation commitment. Learning beyond the classroom is well-evidenced to transform outcomes and is one of the most powerful tools we have for breaking down barriers to opportunity and tackling inequality, which is exactly why this Enrichment Framework matters. As the national voice for all learning beyond the classroom, we’re ready with tried and tested ways to help every school turn this ambition into reality, supporting them to build on what they already do and minimise additional workload
What next?
Join our online event
Making sense of the new Enrichment Framework
Join this free online session to explore what we know about the new Enrichment Framework.
Thursday 24th September
3:45pm – 4:45pm
Download our Enrichment LOtC Flyer
Our Enrichment LOtC Flyer that will help you to visualise the overlap between LOtC and the Government’s Enrichment Framework.
Download and share with your colleagues.
Find out more about Learning Beyond...
Learning Beyond is our programme of support for schools and settings.
It is proven to strengthen schools’ existing LOtC offer, developing an embedded, inclusive whole school approach, minimising the impact on workload.
