Category Archives: recruitment

Headteacher turnover in England – August 2025 to July 2026

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At the end of this month, I will put together my latest annual report on headteacher turnover across state-funded schools in England. Today, the total number of vacancies recorded since the 1st August 2025 has reached 1,400. Add in re-advertisements, and the total number of different advertisements for a headship in a state school in England has reached nearly 1,650 by this morning.

Apart from seven small local authorities, details of at least one vacancy have been recorded from all other local authorities in England. In some large authorities, more than 30 vacancies have been recorded during the past 12 months.

Themes the report will consider are likely to include: the pay of headteachers, and especially the pay of headteachers of small schools; whether some schools have more difficulty recruiting a new head and what matters? This will include, location, percentage of free school meals pupils; academy or maintained school; religious or secular; large of small, and finally, the time of year of the original advertisement.

The headteacher advertisements from 1,004 schools admitting primary age children (including all-age schools) collected so far, compares relatively closely to the 1,101such vacancies recorded in a previous report compiled in December 2018. A more detailed look at longer-term trends will be included in the January updated report that will also consider re-advertisements, including the re-advertisement posted during the autumn term of 2026.

The current age profile of the teaching profession – see 36th Report of the STRB for details, should be relatively helpful for headship vacancies, with a respectable number of possible candidates within the age-groups from which headteachers are traditionally drawn.

The market for secondary school headteachers is usually more buoyant than that for headteachers of primary schools, partly because the ratio of deputy heads to headteachers is greater in secondary schools.

Each year, a number of headteacher switch to another schools. Sadly, just reviewing vacancies cannot identify the number of such moves.

Another issue is that of the undefined term ‘Executive Head’. The term can mean a variety of different things, from just head of a single school to headship f a couple of schools to a post in a multi-academy trust with responsibility for a group of schools. This year, my study of vacancies has largely only considered vacancies for a headteacher of a single school, whatever their title. However, a couple of vacancies for ‘executive heads’ of infant and junior schools with the same school name have been included, as I consider that they are effectively one unit.

I first started collecting data about headteacher vacancies more than 40 years ago in the early 1980s, many of the issue I encountered in those early studies are still visible today.

Finally, are all vacancies now advertised? An annual check of the headteachers’ name on the DfE site containing school information should provide the answer, but it may be complicated by any interim headteachers pushing up the totals. No doubt AI can solve that problem. I will consider it for the report next January.

Pay tuition fees of trainee teachers

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The House of Commons Treasury (Select) Committee today published its report into university tuition fees. One of its conclusions was that;

2. 3. 4. The student loans system is complex. The terms and conditions of loans must be examined within the context of the entire system. The overall level of subsidy provided by the state to the individual is the defining factor in how the loan then operates. (Conclusion, Paragraph 17) Although the government claimed that its subsidy is in the region of 30% to 40%, we saw evidence indicating that individual contributions from students graduating today could be as high as 95%. That was not what the government or Parliament intended, when Parliament agreed the Plan 2 legislation. Society benefits from individuals going to university. Therefore, society should contribute to the cost of an individual’s higher education. We agree with Sir Philip Augar that the split between state and individual should be around 50:50. Terms and conditions matter. Even a very clever system that strikes a generally acceptable balance between the taxpayer and individual contributions will not be sustainable in the long term, if individual terms and conditions within that system are deemed economically or politically intolerable by stakeholders or loan holders. (Conclusion, Paragraph 18)

Student loans: Broken and unfair? My highlighting in bold

Reading that conclusion made me wonder how much should someone wanting to be a teacher expect to pay in tuition fees and interest on the loan in order to enter the profession?

Does it matter that a twenty two year old will pay far more in tuition fee repayments, due to interest costs, than someone entering teacher training in their thirties from a high paying job in London with their original undergraduate loan paid off? The twenty two year old will likely be paying interest on their combined undergraduate and ITT tuition fees for their whole teaching career.

Does it matter that if you are on Teach First, a graduate teaching apprenticeship, or some other route that pays a salary, you will incur no extra student debt training to become a teacher? Should there be equity between routes into teaching?

Yesterday, in my post about teachers’ pay, I revealed how poorly teachers were paid compared with many other graduate professions. Are teachers paid a fair wage for being a graduate? | John Howson

Now for a bit of history. When the Labour government took power in the summer of 1997, and decided to introduce tuition fees for courses including postgraduate ITT courses, I was still working at the then Teacher Training Agency, as its Chief Professional Adviser on Teacher Supply.

Frank Dobson, as Secretary of State for Health was adamant that trainee nurses should not pay tuition fees, although I need to remind myself whether or not he took the same line about the professions allied to medicine and for trainee doctors.

David Blunkett, as Secretary of State for Education, took the line that undergraduate trainees should pay tuition fees, but that the State would effectively pay the fees of those on approved postgraduate courses leading to QTS. One consequence of this decision, a decision that I recall discussing with a senior civil servant at the Department, was the decline in undergraduate ITT, especially for secondary subjects: it still lingers on for would-be primary school teachers.

One of the more pernicious and short-sighted decisions of the coalition government that emerged after the 2010 general election was to remove the payment of tuition fees by the government for postgraduate ITT courses.

I have always opposed that decision. A better solution would have been to rebate the tuition fee once a teacher started working for the State. To make it fair, it would have been necessary to ensure all those gaining QTS, and having paid tuition fees, were offered a teaching or other government funded post. Those working for private school or outside teaching would still have had to repay their loans.

In the light of today’s Treasury Committee’s conclusion that they, ‘saw evidence indicating that individual contributions from students graduating today could be as high as 95%.’, I believe that the current Secretary of State should either revert to the pre-2010 situation or find some other way of relieving trainee teachers of the burden of tuition fee debt.

Sadly, I think there is little that can be done for previous generations of teachers still weighed down with tuition fee debt, except perhaps a deal with mortgage companies to allow the debt to be transferred to extend a mortgage to repay the capital and allow the remaining debt to be paid at a lower rate of interest than the government charges.

Alternatively, schools, MATs and local authorities might look at ways of taking over the debt at a lower interest rate.

I think it says something about the teaching profession, and its professional associations that the issue of the burden of tuition fees for teachers has not been a higher priority.

Perhaps the present evidence from the STRB and Treasury Reports might persuade the professional assoiations into action on behalf of their members.

Action from the Liberal Democrats, my Party, and a participant in the 2010 decision to make trainee teachers pay fees, would also be welcome; I am not holding my breath.

Are teachers paid a fair wage for being a graduate?

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Last week, the DfE published the latest report from the School Teachers Review body (STRB) School Teachers’ Review Body – THIRTY-SIXTH REPORT – 2026 This is the 36th Report from this body. Its recommendations on pay were accepted by the Secretary of State.

While the headline increases in pay, in percentage terms, seem generous, in reality they are part of a catching up exercise of a similar type to that which caused the hard-fought battle with resident doctors in the NHS.

Here’s what the STRB said about teachers’ pay over the past decade and a half:

• The real-terms value of median teacher earnings has fallen since the early 2010s. The fall in real teacher pay has been greater than that for other professional occupations.

• When comparing teachers’ pay to that of other professional occupations by age and region using data from the SWC and the ONS, teachers fell below the comparators in all groups. The gaps between median teacher pay and that of other professionals was greatest in London.

• Based on proprietary benchmarking data, starting pay for teachers is between the lowest quartile and median for roles of comparable size and scope.

These three comments seem to justify the pay rise, and it is not a generous settlement in a vibrant labour market for graduates. If that market cools between now and 2027, possibly because of the effects of AI on entry level jobs, it will be interesting to see what the next STRB pay report suggests.

The STRB summed up the situation in the most recent period as follows:

In 2024-25, for the Rest of England and London, teachers’ median earnings were below those of the comparator groups for all age bands. The gaps between teachers’ earnings and those of the comparator group were greatest in London.

Across most age categories, the relative earnings of teachers deteriorated from 2014-15 to 2019-20, both in the Rest of England and London. After a slight improvement in 2020-21 during the COVID-19 pandemic, this downward trend for relative earnings continued across all age categories to 2023-24. Over the latest period, between 2023-24 and 2024-25, the relative earnings of teachers have slightly improved, although their median earnings remain below other professional occupation counterparts.

Overall, teachers aged 21 to 30 compared least favourably against the other professional occupations, both in the Rest of England and in London. Those in the oldest age group (over 60) compared most favourably, although are still behind relative earnings of those in other professional occupations. Page 70

In summery the STRB concluded that;

Our analysis of real-terms pay changes over time suggests that the competitiveness of teachers’ earnings compared to the whole economy, wider public sector and to professional occupations, was lower in 2024/25 compared to 2010/11. Figure B.10 shows how the real-terms value of teachers’ median earnings fell throughout the early 2010s. The chart shows there was some improvement for teachers between 2018/19 and 2020/21, prior to the pay pause in 2021/22, and a period of decline to 2023/24. There was some improvement in 2024/25, however we estimate that teachers’ median gross earnings in 2024/25 were 13.9% below their level in 2010/11 in real terms. Median gross earnings for the whole economy were 0.6% below their 2010/11 level, whilst median gross earnings for professional occupations were 9.2% below their 2010/11 level, in real terms. Page 71

One issue potentially facing the STRB could be the problem of a single pay scale for all teachers when the labour markets for primary and secondary school teachers are operating in very different ways. However, it would be a brave government that tackled this issue. Most likely, a move on allowances, and how they are offered, could be the obvious way to tackle over-supply in the primary school labour market, and areas of shortage in the secondary school teacher labour market.

The STRB had something to say about the axing of bursaries from some ITT subjects.

111. The number of bursaries available for 2026/27 has been reduced across a range of subjects, with others seeing a reduction in the bursary value. The bursary values for Biology and Geography are both down by 21,000, while Modern Foreign Languages and Design Technology are down by 6,000. Art, Music and Religious Education are down by 10,000 to zero, with English down by 5,000 to zero. We also note that for Business Studies, Music, Religious Education, Modern Foreign Languages and Design Technology, the reduction in bursary value coincides with the failure to reach target entrant numbers in 2025/26. P101 My emphasis

There is also an interesting table (B21) that provides evidence to support my posts over the past year querying why music and also Religious Education lost their bursaries. Pages 100 to 102, and especially table B21, where music and Religious Education were placed in the top three subjects for the lowest percentages of ITT placed filled, provide cogent evidence for the need for an explanation as to how bursaries are allocated to different subjects?

I think the STRB are sending a coded message to the DfE in this report about the lack of bursaries in some of the subjects that struggle most to recruit. The DfE’s answer, backed by HM Treasury, would no doubt be that there are few graduates in these subjects to entice into teaching, so the bursary would be paid to those already choosing teaching as a career. Funny how that argument doesn’t work for physics or mathematics.

A couple of other interesting nuggets for the STRB report:

• In 2024/25, male teachers had higher earnings overall than female teachers across all school types. Median earnings were higher in secondary schools than in primary and nursery schools.

• Based on proprietary benchmarking data, starting pay for teachers is between the lowest quartile and median for roles of comparable size and scope. …. The comparative basic salary position of leadership roles in primary schools is generally below the market base salary data, whilst roles in secondary schools are better aligned to the market base salary data.

• The full-time equivalent (FTE) teacher workforce decreased by 0.1% or 432 between 2023 and 2024. Secondary schools once again saw the largest absolute increase in teacher numbers.

• The proportion of teachers from an ethnic minority background remained stable, with 89% of teachers across state-funded schools being white. The proportion of white teachers is higher in nursery and primary schools than in secondary schools and increases with seniority in leadership roles.

Finally, a word about leadership pay. The STRB concluded that:

2.25 The comparative salary position of leadership roles in primary schools falls below the market salary data in all regions, whilst leadership roles in secondary schools are better aligned to the market salary data. P11

After a year of tracking headteacher vacancies, I do wonder why anyone would take on a job both teaching and leading a small primary school for a salary of little more than £60,000 from September when a classroom teacher with no responsibilities, and a similar length of service could be earning nearly £53,000.

Little more than £10,000 extra, for both the loss of the 1,265 working time protection and all the extra responsibilities, seems like a gross imbalance in differentials. This is especially the case when all primary leaders, and not just headteachers, work on average 5.1 hours more than classroom teachers. Table B14 page 91.

I will say more about the issue of headteachers’ pay when I publish my review of headteacher vacancies for 2025-26 at the end of August.

The saviour for the government when considering future pay is ‘falling pupil numbers’. This issue makes the need to recruit teachers, especially with the current age distribution of those teachers in employment less of an overall challenge.

However, as indicated earlier in this post, dealing with the consequences of different primary, secondary and further education labour markets may be a real issue for the next STRB Report.

Dear Secretary of State – updated

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Two years ago, after the general election, I posted this open letter to the new Secretary of State. With the possibility of a cabinet reshuffle following the arrival of a new Prime Minister, I though it was worth taking a second look at my thoughts of two years ago, and what has changed.

Posted on July 6, 2024

At this important time in our history, I thought that I would post my views for the new Secretary of State for Education

An Open Letter to the Secretary of State for Education

Dear Secretary of State,

You have a tough job ahead of you. Firstly, you need to clear up problems resulting from the campaign promise of 6,000 extra teachers. Those of us in the know, are aware that this September, as for the past few years, all the training places for new secondary school teachers are not being filled. Those gaps need to be filled before you can start on adding 6,000 new teachers to the total.

We don’t have 6,000 more teachers, and training targets have been cut in many subjects, so reaching what you and I might have thought of as 6,000 extra teachers seems unlikely, and the pledge will be subject to a sleight of hand to show it has been achieved.

Don’t think of an easy way out, such as upgrading some teaching assistants to teachers, because it is teachers for the secondary schools that we need, not more teachers for primary schools.

And then, there is the state of our school buildings. Even before the concrete crisis, many of our primary schools were time expired, and many are more than 150 years old. There needs to be a programme of replacement and, for those that will remain, a programme to help make them carbon neutral or even sources of renewable energy. After all, school playgrounds are not being used for their key purpose for 95% of the year. How can we make them earn their keep for the rest of the year, by being sources of renewable power?

Some progress on buildings, but not much, and no real policy advocacy around renewables.

Don’t get me started on funding for 16-19 year olds. That’s a battle with the Treasury you must win. At the same time, you could increase the upper age for free transport for young people in rural areas from 16 up to the de facto if not de jure leaving age of 18 from where it now stops at 16. Start by offering it this September to those staying in the same school. This is a levelling up programme for rural areas.

Rural transport, and indeed, 16-18 transport has been ignored. This is despite the fact it may contribute to NEET numbers in rural areas. I have suggested reviewing motor insurance tax for 16-18s where there is no public transport to school or college, and extending free transport to 18 for those that receive it up to age 16. No sign government understands this issue.

AI and technology are important to our country’s future, and we need to work out how they impact on our education system. Are we training new and existing teachers in a curriculum and teaching style for the future, not the past? Do we need a research body for teaching and learning in schools?

Much more to be done here; especially in training new teachers. New teachers entering preparation courses this September at age 22, might not retire until 2063. In the past 40 years we have seen, the microprocessor revolution; the internet and social media sensation, and now AI. How have we responded to this revolution, every bit as significant as the arrival of printing more than 500 years ago: we have banned mobile phones from schools.

I am sure you will have much to say about early years, and perhaps you could reverse the name change Mr Gove announced when he had your job in 2010.  Bring back the Department for Children Education and Families.

Hopefully, early years will be a success story, but outcomes need monitoring especially for those children that fall behind when they reach school. Do you favour schools having an on-site nursery? What about a qualified workforce?

There are other issues, such as higher education, private schools and the consequences of VAT on fees, and the relationship between local authorities and the academies sector, not least for children in care that you will have to deal with, but solving the teacher supply crisis is the number one priority.

Well, we have VAT on school fees and it has shaken the tree for some of the weaker schools that were also suffering from falling rolls. However, there are still not enough teachers for state schools, and private schools can attract teachers where there are shortages leaving more challenging schools with less well qualified staff. What’s the policy to deal with this problem?

The dual regime of democratically controlled local authorities nominally responsible for maintained schools and the academy sector responsible to Whitehall and with no local democratic accountability is a blot on your copybook. Following the Blair/Brow government’s line on ducking the issue of selective schools for some and comprehensive schools for others is a waste of a big majority, especially as most Labour MPs represent areas with comprehensive schools.

You could take a leaf out of David Blunkett’s approach in 1997, and pay the fees of all trainee teachers studying as postgraduates to enter the profession. Paying them all a training salary, as his successor introduced, and the coalition removed, would be another step forward. This year, it should be possible to pay the bills from the unfilled training places where the money has already been allocated by H M Treasury plus the VAT receipts from private school fees.

Training to be a teacher is still expensive in debt terms for many. Working abroad after qualification can bring higher income, and no fee repayments while abroad.

If the government is serious about education, then now is the time for action. Good luck in your first 100 days in the job.

However, will you still be in post after the arrival of the new Prime Minister? Of will we have to start all over again?

DfE Vacancy website: two irritations

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For years one of the features of the DfE’s vacancy website that has irritated me is the seemingly random repeating of vacancies. The example below, seen this morning, is an extreme example of this tendency, with the two adverts for the same vacancy appearing next to each other on the same page. I never know whether this is either a coding glitch that has existed since the site became active or a deliberate attempt to ensure some vacancies are repeated in case viewers missed them on their first appearance in the listing or search. Either way, putting the two versions next to each other doesn’t seem to me to be sensible.

Headteacher

Bordesley Green Girls’ School & Sixth Form, Birmingham, B9 4TR

Full-time equivalent salary

L33 to L39

School type

Local authority maintained school, ages 11 to 18

Working pattern

Full time

Closing date

30 June 2026 at 9am

Visa sponsorship

Visas cannot be sponsored

Headteacher

Bordesley Green Girls’ School & Sixth Form, Birmingham, B9 4TR

Pay scale

L33 to L39

School type

Local authority maintained school, ages 11 to 18

Working pattern

Full time

Closing date

30 June 2026 at 9am

Visa sponsorship

Visas cannot be sponsored

Another irritation of the DfE vacancy site, as far as I am concerned, is that a search on the term ‘headteacher’ can result in random vacancies for other posts appearing in the search, such as this on today for an ‘assistant principal’. This is not an issue at this time of year when there are few vacancies on the site, but is more of an issue when there are a couple of hundred vacancies to consider.

Assistant Principal – Behaviour and Alternative Provision

More than one location, Archway Learning Trust

Full-time equivalent salary

From £67,898 to £75,049 per annum

School type

1 academy, None, ages 11 to 19

Working pattern

Full time

Closing date

6 July 2026 at 9am

Visa sponsorship

Visas cannot be sponsored

Both the issues mentioned here may cause problems for AI generated searches aimed at counting the number of vacancies for particular post.  The search mechanism would need to be very sophisticated to cope with such anomalies.

This is the reason why, at present, I still spend a couple of hours a week studying the list of vacancies. I would be delighted if anyone would provide me with a foolproof automated regime to collect vacancies, because forty years of collecting headteacher vacancies has taught me that it is not a straightforward exercise.

Later next month, when I come to write my annual report of the 2025/26 school-year and headteacher vacancies, I will discuss some of those issues in more detail, including ‘what is an Executive headteacher’ and do we need a definition?

Meanwhile, I have collected data on just under 1,400 nursery, primary, secondary and special schools that are state-funded and located in England and have advertised for a head teacher since 1st August 2025.

Since January, I have also been collecting data about vacancies for teachers of music in state-funded secondary schools. Next year, I might expand that to include private schools so that I can understand the completion for teachers across both sectors.

Watch our for the report that will be published either in Late July or August this year.

Is the DfE’s Teacher Supply Model outdated?

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For most of my adult life, the government department responsible for the supply of teachers, whether it was called the DfE, DES, DfEE or by another name, has used a version of the Teacher Supply Model to calculate future teacher needs, and presumably to ensure the government doesn’t waste money training too many teachers.

Training too few teachers, not as a result of the Model, but because of under-recruitment into training, has been a problem for the Teacher Supply Model (TSM) during periods of teacher shortage. Do you either add the under-recruitment to the TSM target in any one year to the next year’s TSM total, thus making it even harder to reach, or do you accept every school starts each new school year in September fully staffed, so there are no vacancies to be filled, even if additional trainees just happened to be recruited. Over the past forty years, both approaches have been tried: neither really works.

I first came across the TSM in the late 1980s when, in response to a Select Committee Report, a technical document explaining the working of the TSM at that time was published. Between the late 1980s, and a seminal announcement, also to a Select committee, by David Laws when he was the Minister of State that the TSM would be part of open government, the TSM remained largely secret, apart from one other document published in the late 1990s in repose to yet another two Select Committee reports.

Why were successive government keen to keep the TSM under wraps? Possibly because the workings allowed for an understanding of future government policy. There are three obvious areas where changes in policy can have consequences for schools and society that might create political debate: reactions to future pupil numbers, whether up or down; changes in education funding that might allow more or less funds for schools; policy changes such as extending the learning leaving age or the introduction of a new subject, such as citizenship or computing. All impact on the TSM

Governments often don’t want to signal policy changes ahead of time, especially if they might be controversial. In the first decade of this century, the secrecy around the TSM almost caught out the ITT sector when falling rolls together with improved ITT recruitment made a reduction in ITT numbers inevitable for secondary subjects, especially as there was no policy around improving staffing levels in the secondary sector, partly because of the decision over the introduction of non-contact time in the primary sector.

Planning is an essential too of any organisation, including governments, whatever extreme free-market thinkers may say. After years of following the consequences of the TSM decisions on the outcomes for the teacher labour market, I have some concerns about what happens when the TSM has been run for any particular year. The elements of the TSM have changed over the years, as explained above in relation to under-recruitment as an example. That’s not an issue for me, although the discussions with the sector may have helped prevent some changes to the TSM in mor recent times.

What is at the core of my concerns about the TSM is the length of time between the collection of the data for input into the TSM and the consequences for the real-time labour market for any September recruitment round, let alone the needs for teachers to fill any January vacancies.

I acknowledge that improved and faster data collection over time thanks to better computing capabilities has helped reduce the time taken between data collection and the effect on the labour market of the TSM output for any recruitment round. Currently, data from the 2025 School Workforce Survey, collected in November 2025, will probably influence the TSM run for the 2027 entry into training, and hence, the 2028 labour market.

At least with most trainees now on a one-year postgraduate training route, there is no longer the issue of a four-year undergraduate course to add into the mix. The November 2025 data collected, if such courses were still a significant part of the ITT scene, would not affect the labour market until 2031. A lot can happen in the intervening years.

Even with the shorter training period, there is still a time lag between data collection and the consequences of that data on the labour market.

My question is, should a further check be added once the TSM has been used to calculate ITT targets, in order to allow the comparison between the TSM target and the current reality of the labour market?

The DfE now has excellent data from several years of operating its own vacancy platform, and there are also private operators monitoring the labour market with useful vacancy data in real time. This data can be compared with the TSM output target to allow a discussion about the validity of the TSM target to current labour market needs.

Now, it may well be that the TSM number is the best fit for training needs, but as my previous post that considered the labour market data for teachers of music alongside the ITT target cut that presumably emerged from the TSM output has suggested, the addition of vacancy data does allow for a debate about whether the TSM target under or over estimates demand. Music ITT: has the government made a mistake? | John Howson

Such use of vacancy data also allows for a consideration of policy changes, such as how schools react to a change in a market where QTS still allows any teacher to teach any subject to any child, and ‘permits the use of unqualified staff. where nobody with QTS is either available or considered sufficiently expert at delivering the curriculum.  

The TSM isn’t outdated, just, in my opinion, no longer enough by itself to ensure an orderly labour market for teachers.

Why is this important, it is because the market does play a part in determining how shortages are dealt with. Where are the qualified teachers of physics teaching? How much more do schools with high levels of free school meals have to spend on recruitment than a school with fewer such pupils? Important questions around the staffing of the nation’s schools.

I read the Fed report on education issued yesterday National Education Report 2026 – FED and believe that the supply of teachers and school leaders is still at the heart of any effective system of education.

How any government determines teacher supply is a vital decision affecting the lives of many young people. Ensuring every child has the best possible teachers throughout their whole school-life is equally as important as whether or not they are banned from social media, but much less often discussed.

I think that teacher supply issues should be much higher up the education agenda, but I would, wouldn’t I, having spent a career worrying about teacher supply matters.   

Music ITT: has the government made a mistake?

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New entrants to postgraduate teacher preparation courses in music in 2026 will not receive a bursary. Instead, they will be need to rely upon either student loans or other funding. How has this change affected applications to train as a music teacher?

The news is not good. The June data for applications is the second worst number since the 2013/14 round more than a decade ago. Only the 2023/23 round post covid that was a terrible round across all subjects, has recorded a lower figure for applications than June 2025. In context, the June number of offers, a better measure than applications, is not far short of half the level seen in the covid year of 202/2, and around 25% below what might be expected in a usual round.

Worry, not because the government has decided that falling rolls over the next few years will mean fewer teachers of music need to be trained. Reducing the target from a requirement of 565 teachers of music in 2024/25 to just a requirement of 260 new trainees in 2025/26 suggests either the previous targets were way out of line or a need to justify the removal of the bursary by setting a target that can be met. After all, it would be unfortunate to remove the bursary as unnecessary, but still miss the target.

So, what of demand from state schools for music? Since January, and the start of the recruitment round for September 2026, I have recorded some 530 schools advertising for a teacher or music. Allowing for the fact that perhaps 100 had a TLR attached, so were not ideal for newly qualified teachers, this suggests 400 posts for newly qualified teachers so far. Add in perhaps another 100 autumn term vacancies and overall demand might be in the range of 400-500 posts or 500-600 posts overall.

The DfE expects about half of vacancies to be taken by existing teachers or returners each year. The exact number depends upon where the demand is and how it relates to supply. But, sticking with the 50% figure means a demand for around 250 to 300 new entrants each year.

Now, with falling rolls be might reduce that number by 10% to 225 to 270 as a requirement. On the face of it, the new target of 260 look risky but manageable. However, it must include two assumptions: all those that are offered eventually complete their courses and of ‘completers’, all join the state secondary school sector.

Both, based upon past trends are unrealistic assumptions. Being generous, 90% of those offered places complete the course. This suggests an output of 236 against a target of 260. Rounding up to 240 new entrants, this mean the new target is still not way of demand.

However, not all ‘completer’s join state schools. Some don’t enter teaching at all; some join Sixth Form Colleges or primary schools; some join the independent sector and some may decide to work overseas in the growing international school market. The 2025 data Less than 400 teachers of physics entered service in 2023/24 | John Howson based upon 2023/24 entry patterns showed that 80% of those gaining a QTS on a music ITT course entered teaching in a state-funded school. This includes both primary, secondary and special schools.

Assuming the 80% as a baseline – the next set of data should be out next month – our total of 240 reduced to less than 200. That number is starting to look as if the cut to music ITT places has been too savage.

A cynic might suggest, but I never could, the target was reduced to ensure it would be met and to save face over the removal of the bursary.

Whatever the reason, the DfE has now risked demand continuing to outstrip supply and this to affect the teaching of music in the nation’s secondary schools. With the recent announcement of the programme to ensure ‘Every child to get access to enriching activities to build skills and confidence for life’, the new target looks even less sensible  Every child to get access to enriching activities to build skills and confidence for life – GOV.UK.

I haven’t seen any campaign from the sector asking the government to revisit the target, but perhaps there should be in light of these numbers unless falling rolls are going to affect the demand for teachers of music more than I have calculated.

I would welcome any comments on the data.

ITT: subjects recruiting from UK graduates still in trouble

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The DfE’s June data on the current round of applications and offers for postgraduate ITT courses still revels that the 2026 round is separating into two distinct sections. Subjects where applications are likely to come from anywhere in the world are either already meeting their Teacher Supply Model target for 2026 entry, or should do so on the current trajectory. Subjects where home recruitment is likely to dominate applications seem more at risk of missing their targets.

SubjectTarget 2026/27offer May 2026Fill: May viewJune offersFill: June view
Chemistry6901015YES1199YES
Biology675474PROBABLY542POSSIBLY
Mathematics20002169YES2495YES
Design & Technology620481YES562YES
Art & Design605527YES601YES
Geography685407POSSIBLY455NO
Classics7540NO43NO
English19801418PROBABLY1586POSSIBLY
Drama370253PROBABLY283PROBABLY
Business Studies1200270NO301NO
Music260192POSSIBLY215PROBABLY
Religious Education450269POSSIBLY308NO
Others2035418NO456NO
History520872YES974YES
Modern Languages10851107YES1214YES
Physics8101342YES1466YES
Physical Education6551298YES1405YES
Computing565686YES794YES

Based upon ‘offer’ recorded in the June update from the DfE, and with just three more reports to come before courses commence, I have made four downgrades and one upgrade to my expected outcomes for the current recruitment round.

I have downgraded expected outcomes for, biology, geography, English and Religious Education, including reducing Religious Education to a ‘No’. however, I am aware that there is a vigorous advertising campaign currently underway by the Religious Education sector, reminiscent of the RETRI initiative led by Dr John Gay a quarter of a century ago. Success in attracting new applicants could mean that it would be possible to hit the target for Religious Education. I do wonder why more subject groups don’t invest in advertising the benefits of becoming a teacher.

If science graduates discover there is space for those with some biology, then that subject might reach its target. Music looks likely to meet the target, but that target, in my opinion, has been set far too low to meet demand from schools, especially with the DfE’s latest initiative on extra-curricular activities for all, including within the scope, music. It will be difficult to achieve success in music without more teachers. However, meeting the low target will justify the removal of the bursary for music ITT.

Applications from outside of the United Kingdom represented 25% of all applications this June compared with 18% in the data for June 2025. If all non-Uk applicants had applied for secondary sector courses, then they would currently account for more than a third of applicants across all subjects, compared with a quarter in June 2025.

More evidence of the lack of interest in teaching from hone-based students comes from the fact that the number of graduates in the age group ’21 and under’ applying for courses is only 115 higher this June at 3,685 compared with an increase in applications of nearly 2,000 from the ’30 to 34’ age grouping.

The increasing interest in teaching from men continues, with applications up from 16,796 in June 2025 to 21,774 this June! It would be useful to know more about where this increase is focussed, and what the implications might be for the sector.

As ever, the DfE continues not to share ethnicity data with the sector. With so many overseas applicants at present, is that a helpful omission from the dataset?

Higher Education continues to bear the brut of the increase in applications, with ‘partner led’ and ‘salaried’ routes static, and only a small increase in applications to SCITT courses. However, PG teaching apprenticeships have seen a healthy increase in applications from 6,328 to 10, 493. However, offers are little changed at 1,066, compared with 966 in June 2025.

Perhaps because of the arrival of the postgraduate apprenticeship route, offers for the ‘salaried route was only 266 this June, compared with 518 in June 2025. Mr Gove’s brave new world of 15 years ago now looks like a distant dream, as higher education continues to take the bulk of applications, proving the resilience of the sector in the face of determined onslaughts during the coalition government to remove its dominance from the training of new graduate teachers.

With the end of the school term rapidly approaching, the next three months traditionally see relatively few new offers: will this year be any different, especially given the press comments about graduates unable to find work, or does teaching still look like an unattractive carer to debt strapped UK graduates?

With falling rolls affecting job prospects after training  and the acquisition of more student debt, and a possible below inflation pay settlement, the signs for increased interest in teaching as a career during the rest of the recruitment round are not good.

No, No, No, please do not impose a GCSE test on university applicants

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There was a discussion this morning on the BBC radio Today programme about a suggestion from Whitehall that everyone claiming a student loan should have a pass in English at GCSE. By English, I assume they mean English Language. I am vehemently opposed to such an idea. Let me explain why.

In the 1960s, when I was in the third year of my sixth form career, with ‘A’ Level grades of BBC in History, Geography and Economics, and a merit in what was then the special Paper, I still didn’t have a pass in English. (After six attempts, I finally succeeded in the following January examination).

Looking to universities where I could apply to study, some of whom had only recently dropped Latin as a compulsory requirement for many subjects, I struggled to find six courses that I could apply for without a pass in English Language.

In the end, LSE, a university with large number of mature students with non-standard entry requirements, Leicester, and a couple of then new universities were my only options. Eventually, I joined my twin brother to study at LSE, following in our father’s footstep, although he studied as a part-time mature student, and I was a full-time day student with both a grant and a scholarship.

So, I oppose any move to ration university places by such an arbitrary measure as a pass in GCSE English, just as I oppose the idea of a sudden death all or nothing Baccalaureate – even the IB, with its many good points.

However, I don’t just rest my opposition on the basis of my personal testimony.  As previous posts on this blog have demonstrated, the education offered to pupils that put their trust in the State to educate them varies significantly from place to place, and over time.

After a period of teacher shortages, lasting more than a decade, the nation may now be moving towards a period when becoming a teacher becomes more difficult and everyone can be taught by teachers qualified in their subject.

But, should those teaching music, art, parts of design, and other subjects be restricted by a requirement to be proficient in English before taking a degree course?

Well, of course, they already are if they want to be a teacher, as ITT has minimum standards. When undergraduate teaching degrees were still commonplace, universities used to set approved tests for those without the paper qualifications in English. I guess such local tests would be a way around any new requirement. However, if the government mandated that access to student loans required either a pass in English or any other such approach, individual institutions might find circumventing the new rule more of a challenge.

The figure of 33,000 students without a pass in English was mentioned in the radio piece. However, we weren’t told what subjects they were studying. There may well be a debate about the numbers going to university, but as a society I would hope that we had moved beyond such an arbitrary rule: then I look at requirements for entry into school sixth forms, and know that today, I would not even have made it to ‘A’ Level, and those grades I acquired, in far too many schools.

We may need more cash for defence, but not at the expense of the education of late developers, those brought up in the wrong geographical area, and those facing the many other barriers already in place for our young people considering higher education and a degree.

It’s the numbers not the percentages that matter most

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Each year, the DfE publishes details about the workforce in schools. The data about teacher numbers are collected in the School Workforce Survey, conducted every November.

Included in the data are details about teacher retention in state funded schools. Interestingly, although the DfE provided the actual number of NQTs each year, the retention data is shown as a percentage of that base number. Release home – School workforce in England – Explore education statistics – GOV.UK as demonstrated in the following table.

The picture is obvious, despite some late arrivals after qualifying, the percentage falls for each extra year of service, so that of the 2010 cohort, only 59.2% were still in service after 10 years.

 Over the past few years, the percentage in service after one year has fluctuated from a low of 85.1 for the 2016 cohort to a high of 89.9 for 2023 cohort, with the 2024 cohort still doing well, with a retention rate of 89.7% at year 2. This looks like good news for the government.

However, there is less good news for the cohort that joined during covid in 2020 and 2012. For these two cohorts, retention after four and five years is poor, and back to levels last seen in 2014 for the 2021 cohort.

So, good news, retention is improving. Might the government even meet its target of of 6,500 extra teachers? Now it is time to change the percentages into numbers.

Here the picture is different. I have projected an extra year for the 2024 cohort and two years for the 2023 cohort just to show what might happen. The behaviour of those two cohorts is very important as they represent the lowest intakes of NQTs since 2010. Sadly, the government doesn’t publish the table by sectors. This is important because it is the key secondary subjects that already start with shortages where retention really matters for the performance of the school system, and especially for the outcomes for children in schools with high percentages of pupils on Free School Meals.

The current ten-year loss numbers show a worrying trend.

Hopefully, this loss of experienced teachers will reduce over the next few years, as the cohorts following the 2015 cohort have better retention numbers and percentages. The real concern is the 2020 and 2021 cohorts.

However, with falling rolls, starting to appear in the secondary sector, and already seriously affecting the primary sector in London, the retention rates for teachers may well improve, if schools can continue to afford the same number of teachers.

As my previous posts have made clear, the relationship between the National Funding Formula and pupil numbers will be crucial to future size of the teaching force. Falling Rolls: Is the funding formula making matters worse? | John Howson