Six exciting new research projects funded by the Education Endowment Foundation will be taking place in schools across England.
EEF research projects are designed to support its mission of ‘ breaking the link between family income and educational achievement’. The projects explore different strategies and programmes to support teaching and learning and provide an opportunity to evaluate their impact and put evidence into practice. The six new projects announced will be tested on how they impact pupil attainment, with a focus on socio-economically disadvantaged learners. Schools will be able to implement these projects at low or no cost.
The six new projects
Commando Joe’s Inspire to Achieve Programme
The Inspire to Achieve Programme is focused on inter-personal development of year 9 pupils. It will be offered to 24 pupils in year 9 in schools participating in the programme. The 24-week programme is run by ‘Commando Joe’s Fun & Fitness Ltd’ and will be for pupils who are ‘underperforming academically, and also struggling with either engagement, attendance, behaviour or emotional wellbeing at school’. Some of the skills the programme aims to develop are: self-regulated learning, metacognition, problem solving, teamwork, resilience and building positive relationships.
The sessions will be 1 hour a week, delivered by an instructor and will be a ‘mix of practical, scenario-based challenges and guided reflection’.
Exploring the impact of offsite planning, preparation, and assessment (PPA) on teacher retention – School Choices
This project will find out if giving teachers the opportunity to have their PPA offsite could help improve teacher retention in primary schools. The EEF notes that there is growing interest in considering if schools should have a policy that allows teachers to spend this time working remotely. The programme will consider if remote PPA time can not only support with retention but also teacher wellbeing, job satisfaction and productivity. The evaluation will be conducted by UCL Institute of Education and the Chartered College of Teaching.
Schools that want to take part will agree to be randomly assigned as either the intervention group (offer all teachers the option to take PPA off-site) or control group (continue with current practices) for the 2026-2027 academic year. For those schools introducing PPA off-site, guidance will be provided to help them do this effectively.
Learning Together for Mental Health
Learning Together for Mental Health is a whole-school multi-component intervention programme that aims to improve mental health, academic outcomes and feelings of school belonging. It also aims to reduce bullying and foster a positive school improvement. The four-year programme for years 7-10, lead by Place2Be, will train staff in restorative and relational practice and provide opportunities for student voice by introducing student-staff ‘action groups’. The strategies learnt will help staff manage conflict, address challenging behaviour and build positive relationships.
Like with the remote PPA intervention, schools will be randomly assigned to either an intervention or control group. Those in the intervention groups will receive training form L30 Relational Systems, as a well as guidance from Place2Be to set up action groups where a small group of staff and students will work together across the academic year.
Learning Together for Mental Health
Adventure and challenge programme
This intensive residential five-day course will provide students with opportunities to take part in adventurous outdoor activities such as gorge scrambling, kayaking and hiking, whilst experiencing ‘community living’. The programme aims to help students’ personal development and wellbeing. It is also hoped that these skills may ‘in turn have a positive impact on academic outcomes.’ Like with the Inspire to Achieve Programme, this intervention will be offered to 24 year 9 students in participating schools, again, with a focus on pupils who need support with wellbeing, behaviour, attendance, engagement or academic progress.
The project will be led by Outward Bound Trust, with the residentials themselves being led by Outward Bound Trust instructors, along with the support of participating school staff.
Adventure and Challenge Programme
PALS-UK
Peer Assisted Learning Strategies (PALS) is a whole-class structured paired reading intervention that aims to improve reading fluency and comprehension. The sessions are delivered by teachers to a year 5 class, three times a week, for 35 minutes. Pupils work together in pairs on four activities: partner reading, retell, paragraph shrinking and prediction relay. The 20-week programme is led by Dr Emma Vardy (University of Nottingham) and Professor Helen Breadmore (University of Birmingham).
Teachers taking part will attend a day of in-person training. They will then spend four weeks training their class in how to take part in PALS-UK activities, then the remaining 16 weeks delivering the sessions. It is noted that the pupils will need access to ‘a range of high-quality, engaging books that will provide each pair with an appropriate level of challenge’ and mentions that a selection of books is available to purchase at a subsidised price (if required).
Rich Retrieval
This pilot project is a professional development programme for Key Stage 2 teachers to ‘support the use of more complex and interconnected retrieval practice’. The project led by a team from Bath Spa University (who all have experience in cognitive science and as primary science teachers) will provide teachers with professional development days, twilight webinars and a bank of supportive resources to use with pupils. The retrieval practice will be delivered in weekly science lessons, for 5-10 minutes at a time.
The project is unfortunately not accepting any more applications but you can still learn more about Rich Retrieval.
References
- EEF (2026) ‘Six new research projects to test approaches in schools – from teachers working from home, to ‘adventure learning’”. Available at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/news/new-research-projects-teachers-working-from-home-to-adventure-learning (Accessed: 02 February 2026)
- EEF (2026) ‘Inspire to Achieve Programme – second trial’. Available at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/projects-and-evaluation/projects/inspire-to-achieve-programme-second-trial (Accessed: 02 February 2026)
- EEF (2026) ‘Exploring the impact of offsite planning, preparation, and assessment (PPA) on teacher retention – School Choices’. Available at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/projects-and-evaluation/projects/school-choices-ppa (Accessed: 02 February 2026)
- EEF (2026) ‘Learning Together for Mental Health – second trial’. Available at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/projects-and-evaluation/projects/learning-together-mental-health-trial (Accessed: 02 February 2026)
- EEF (2026) ‘Adventure and Challenge Programme – second trial’. Available at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/projects-and-evaluation/projects/adventure-and-challenge-programme-second-trial (Accessed: 02 February 2026)
- EEF (2026) ‘PALS-UK – third trial’. Available at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/projects-and-evaluation/projects/pals-uk-third-trial (Accessed: 02 February 2026)
- EEF (2026) ‘Rich Retrieval – pilot’. Available at: https://educationendowmentfoundation.org.uk/projects-and-evaluation/projects/rich-retrieval-pilot-trial (Accessed: 02 February 2026)
