When I started this blog, way back in 2013, universities were out of favour with the government as a route to train teachers. Indeed, Mr Gove once famously used the term ‘blob’ Am I a blob? | John Howson Now, he was referring to local government, but he might just as well have been fingering university departments of education, such was his dislike of their approach to preparing teachers. He much preferred schools as the location for those learning to become a teacher.
Some years later, this blog reviewed the balance between applications to different routes into teaching. I expressed my views in a post in . A thank you to Schools of Education | John Howson
In that post, I reviewed the percentages for applications in May over four years, as derived from the then UCAS monthly data reports. This was before the DfE took over recruitment through their portal
So here are the percentages for applications in May over the four years reported in that post and as derived from the then UCAS monthly data reports.
| Primary | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 |
| HE | 51 | 45 | 48 | 47 |
| SCITT | 8 | 9 | 9 | 10 |
| SDFEE | 24 | 27 | 25 | 25 |
| SDSAL | 17 | 19 | 18 | 18 |
| Secondary | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 |
| HE | 51 | 47 | 50 | 52 |
| SCITT | 8 | 10 | 11 | 12 |
| SDFEE | 29 | 31 | 29 | 28 |
| SDSAL | 12 | 12 | 9 | 7 |
I thought it might be interesting to see what has happened since the years of the covid pandemic. (I don’t have 2018-2020 data easily to hand). The monthly data for applications is no longer split between primary and secondary, one of a few unhelpful changes to the data presentation. But, at least, there is still monthly data available, and that data has provided fertile grounds for this blog over the years.
The first point to note, when comparing the two tables, is the change in categories, with the ‘Fee’ route disappearing and the ‘Lead Provider’ route replacing it. The ‘teaching degree apprenticeship’ has also appeared, and is now in its second year of applications. Will its significance grow over the next few years?
| ALL | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 |
| HE | 48 | 41 | 38 | 40 | 42 |
| SCITT | 14 | 18 | 16 | 20 | 17 |
| Fee Route | 28 | ||||
| SALARIED | 6 | 7 | 11 | 9 | 8 |
| LEAD PROV | 0 | 30 | 28 | 21 | 19 |
| PG T APP | 4 | 5 | 7 | 8 | 12 |
| T DeGRE APP | 0 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 2 |
It is also worth noting that these are percentages. As a result, they hide the fact that in the period covered by the earlier table, pupil rolls were on the increase, and thus more teachers needed to be trained. Will falling rolls, fewer teachers need to be trained currently. Whether that has affected the view of teaching as a career, is of no immediate concern in this post, as the basis is the percentages applying for each route.
Apprenticeship have now secured a strong foothold in the minds of would-be teachers, accounting for 14% or nearly one in seven applications by the end of May 2026. School Centred Courses (SCITTs) have been around for more than 30 years now. In May 2025 they accounted for 25% of applications, but have fallen back in 2026 to 17% this May.
The various salaried routes saw an increase in applications after covid, but, possibly because of the graduate apprenticeship route, their percentage seems to be in decline from the 11% of applications reached in May 2024 to eight per cent in 2026.
Seemingly, higher education is the main loser; down from 48% in 2022 to 42% in May 2026. This is nine percentage points below its position in May 2015, when higher education accounted for 52% of applications. I suspect that a significant percentage of the decline is down to fewer primary places being on offer in the past few years. As those courses normally ‘fill’ with offers early in the cycle, fewer places will have generated fewer applications. The four-percentage point gain over the past two years, may be down to an increase in ‘rest of the world’ applicants who may know more about universities than the other routes on offer. The DfE no doubt has that data, but it is not shared in the monthly statistics.
Where to place the Provider Led courses? Are they a direct transfer from the former School Direct Fee route, or something different. Either way, either their popularity or their availability to applicants, has seen their percentage decline quite steeply in recent years.
The data in this post is based upon trends in applications. At some point in the future, I will look at trends in ‘offer’ and actual attendance, as measured by the ITT Census, produced each December by the DfE. The post also uses the month of May data, not the endo f the round .This is because by May some subjects and the primary sector are often not accepting any more applications, so May is a good time to review the application round when the majority of courses have been accepting applications.
For now, the universities are still the leading route into teaching, but will vice chancellors still want to play in this game as they consider their financial futures, especially if targets, and thus income will be reducing because of falling rolls? Smaller groups are often uneconomic, and subsidy is not the name of the game in higher education at present. Interesting times.
