Tag Archives: ITT recruitment

Death of the arts

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The grim news from the July data on recruitment to ITT postgraduate courses starting this autumn is that most arts subjects are recording offer levels below those of last year. Initial teacher training application statistics for courses starting in the 2023 to 2024 academic year – Apply for teacher training – GOV.UK (apply-for-teacher-training.service.gov.uk)

The 2022 recruitment round was the worst for many years, and while some subjects have recovered from the disastrous offer levels of last year, the arts subjects have continued their downward trend in offers in most cases. This is grim news for schools wanting to recruit for September 2024, as the data in the table below makes clear.

Subjects where offers are below the July 2022 and July 2021 levels

Art

Religious Education

Physical Education

Music

History

Subjects where offers are above the July 2022 abut below July 2021 levels

Languages

Mathematics

Computing

Chemistry

Business Studies

Subjects where offers are above the July 2022 and July 2021 levels

Physics

Geography

English

Design & Technology

Biology

Subjects where offers are below the July 2022 levels

Drama

Classics

‘Other’ subjects

Subjects in italics are those where it seems likely that the 2023 target will not be met even if ‘offers’ are better this year.

Both art and music are subjects where offers are down this year compared with 2022. In the case of art from 910 in July 2021 to just 478 this July. For music, the fall during the same period has been from 410 offers to just 224 offers this July. Drama is down from 364 offers last July to 275 this July. Offers at this level, even if all candidates turn up, will not produce enough trainees to meet the needs of schools next year.

The good news, such as it appears to be, is in subjects such as English, languages (other than classics) and geography. These are subjects where the level of applications has been large enough to allow offer levels to mean that the target should be met for the year.

However, a word of warning. Recruited numbers in four regions, including both London and the South East are below the number recorded in July 2022. Overall ‘recruited’ total is 3,395 down on July 2022, of 3,911. Also, those with ‘conditions pending’ are down by 124 on last year, creating a net loss across these two categories. There must, therefore be some uncertainty about the outcome of the recruitment round in terms of trainee numbers that will turn up in September.

Numbers of applicants in the youngest age categories are still below those for July 2022, whereas applications from candidates in the older age groupings continue to be above the levels seen in 2022.

The number of rejected applications has increased from 31,124 in July 2022 to 52,350 in July 2023. Lat year that represented 31.5% of applications. This July, it represented 40% of applications. Whether or not this increase is related to the origins of the applications is impossible to tell from the data. However, it would not surprise me if many of those rejected were in the ‘rest of the world’ category.

Barring any last-minute change next month, and with many school-based schemes not actively recruiting now, it seems likely that 2024 with be another grim year for schools recruiting teachers, especially, but not exclusively in some of the art subjects that the independent sector values more highly that the government seems to do.

Potential new teachers?

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Will the announcement of a pause in recruitment to the prestigious Civil Service Fast Track Scheme be good news for teaching? In an attempt to cut back on the number of civil servants, the government is considering not recruiting to the Fast Track Scheme for ayear, according to some newspaper reports. This is a dangerous move for long-term workforce planning, as some police forces discovered when recruitment was frozen for constables.

However, a large number of graduates looking for a career and not able to join the civil service might mean some will consider teaching as an alternative career. So, it might be a silver lining for teaching, although we probably don’t need more history graduates applying to become teachers.

Alternatively, universities might find more applications for one-year higher degrees increases as potential candidates wait out the recruitment freeze by acquiring a further qualification.

Much will depend upon whether the labour market for graduates remains competitive or whether the worsening economic situation once again makes teaching seem like a safe haven in a possible economic storm.

 Either way, the DfE should consider once again paying the fees for all graduate trainees as they did between 1997 and 2010. This is an easy to sell inducement into teaching and its cost is quantifiable.

This blog has pointed out before the inequality of two teachers in adjacent classrooms on very different packages: one with a salary, the other with a new round of student loan debt now at an interest rate in excess of 12%. Why teacher should be required to pay to train when the Fast Track civil servants aren’t – they could have kept the scheme open and charged the same fees as trainee teacher’s pay – but that would have been unfair to those not able to fund the costs. I have also noted before that as a society we pay trainee officers in the forces a salary, but not trainee teachers.

While schools have been using the pool of PE trainees to fill vacancies, especially for January appointments, it has been suggested to me that schools might also look at offering joint history/RE appointments, perhaps under the guise of humanities posts. There is a shortage of RE teachers and, as noted, lots of unemployed history trainees looking for teaching posts. In the same way, art trainees can work in the design part of design and technology departments, at least at Key Stage 3.

Today marks the normal final resignation day for serving teachers intending to leave their jobs this summer. 2022 has been a record year for vacancies, and TeachVac passed the million hits in a month for the first time in its history in May.

 Our new Premium Service for schools, based on a No Match: No fee basis, is also selling well into the market as schools increasingly realise that in a challenging labour market, they cannot afford to miss potential candidates registered with a job board now it its eight year of operation.  

QTS for life?

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Re-reading my submission to the Carter Review https://johnohowson.wordpress.com/2014/06/23/a-submission-to-the-carter-review/ from way back in 2014, made me think that the recent Market Review of ITT discussed in the previous two posts on this blog missed another important point. Because it was focused on the delivery mechanism and content of ITT and not the candidates undergoing the training in deciding how to create world class teachers it missed discussing some important issues, such as should QTS last for life and can a world-class profession continue with a QTS award that allows any teacher to teach anything to any pupil with no check. What is the point of a subject knowledge requirement if at the end of a course a PE teacher can be employed to teach science on the basis that they have a sports science degree?

Changing the rules on preparation courses without looking at the ‘downstream’ consequences is a bit like closing the stable door before you have even put the horse inside. What’s the appropriate preparation to teach humanities if it contains elements of history; geography and even religious education? Do you need post ‘A’ level qualifications in each subject area to be able to teach it? As far as I can tell, the Market Review is silent on this type of discussion. Then there are the subjects taught at Key Stages 4 & 5 that are barely recognised in the Teacher Supply Model but where schools actively recruit each year. These subjects include, economics, psychology, sociology and law. Most of these subjects have more posts advertised each year by schools than does Latin, a subject recognised by the DfE in the Teacher Supply Model.

As already alluded to, the issue of moving from training to employment is a discussion that merits more attention that was paid to it in the Review. It is appropriate to assume that the best quality trainees are the first to secure teaching posts: a sensible assumption if the market works properly. Such an outcome would leave the weakest students sometimes without a teaching post for September, but available to fill the vacancies that arise for the following January, often due to maternity leave arrangements. How should the system deal with these teachers-in-waiting? Ignore them as at present? Hope that they will pick up supply work? Ensure every teacher passing the training component is offered a teaching post for September of at least one year in duration?

A Review that talks about world class teachers and deals with initial training and professional development, but ignores the realities of life, won’t easily achieve its aims for the system as a whole. The issue of the length of time a teacher could spend working as a supply teachers was tackled some time ago, but the issue of a gap between completing training and starting teaching in the subject and phase of your training has not really been addressed. I think such an omission is a mistake.

I am sure that the All Party Parliamentary Group on the Teaching Profession and its associated Special Interest Group or SIG will be taking a look at the Review before the summer.

ITT: hiccup not a change in direction?

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Secondary schools across England might want to start thinking about their staffing needs for 2022 and 2023. Evidence from the data released earlier today by UCAS about application levels for postgraduate ITT courses reveals some disturbing trends.

This time last year, the pandemic caused something of a flurry of applications to train as a teacher. Applications have continued to increase this year and are currently about 24% higher for primary sector courses- why supply is generally adequate – but only 10% high for the secondary sector overall. Within that sector there are some significant increases, but also some worrying numbers in terms of applications.

Looking at the key curriculum subject,s there must be concerns that in IT, design & technology, geography, languages, business studies and physics there will not be enough applicants of suitable quality to meet the number of places on offer. In business studies and physics there are more applicants than last year, but current trends suggest that unless there is a wave of new graduates seeking to enter teacher preparation courses over the summer the targets won’t be universally met.

In languages, the total number of applications this years is down in most languages on the May 202 number. The same is true for design and technology, where applications are down from 1,190 in May 2020 to 980 this May. So, far only 260 applications have been offered places, with just 30 fully placed.

A significant proportion of the increase in applications are in subjects such as history (+1,100) PE (+1,000) and mathematics (+1,830), whereas geography has 650 fewer applications than last year and biology around 2,000 fewer. History and PE are not subjects where more applicants are needed to meet targets, although more should equate to more choice and better teachers.

These numbers don’t suggest a golden age for secondary school teaching as a career, and should do more than cause a pause for thought at the School Teachers’ Review Body.

In the North East region the number of applicants, at 1,450 this May, is actually around 50 below the figure for May 2020. Fortunately, in London there are some 1,300 more applicants than last year and around 700 more in the South East. Applicants are also still remaining in the process, withdrawals are holding at 23% of applications, and are only up from two to three per cent of applicants.

Another interesting straw in the wind is that there are has been virtually no increase in applicants over the age of 40 when compared with May 2020 total for this age group. Younger career switchers are still looking at teaching as a career, but the increase in new graduates still remains sluggish. This is an area where better data would help flesh out the real picture in the secondary sector. How many of the applications for PE have come from personal trainers that have seen their business disappear? And why are applications for design and technology so low. At current levels, it is difficult to see a future for the subject in our schools, a point made in the past by this blog.

Finally, the Postgraduate Apprentice route seems to be heading towards a situation where it will take over from the School Direct Salaried route. How much longer can that route survive with less than 200 offers in the secondary sector, and fewer than 400 in the primary sector?

If there is not an influx of applicants in some subjects between now and the start of courses, then schools will find recruitment in 2022 challenging. If these numbers are a portent of a decline in interest in teaching, then the levelling up agenda may well be wishful thinking, unless a new strategy for teacher supply is introduced.  

UCAS end of 2020 cycle ITT data

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UCAS has today published the end of cycle data for courses that started last autumn. Regular readers that follow this blog will know that much of what is contained in the data has been commented upon in posts on this blog la the August and October.

However, ‘The End of Cycle’ (EoC) report contains much more information than the regular monthly updates published during the cycle. One area is in that of the ethnicity of applicants and the percentages accepted. Why gender is seen as capable of being revealed each month and ethnicity is not is an interesting question. I assume it is down to the fact that numbers in some categories would be too small to make publication viable or appropriate.

Regardless of the reason, the EoC report contains some interesting data.

Accepted percentages 2020 from UCAS PG ITT data
MaleFemaleAll
Black37%53%48%
Other41%51%48%
Asian50%61%58%
Not Stated55%57%56%
Mixed [sic]58%62%61%
Total63%70%68%
White67%74%72%

Source: UCAS

Black male applicants had less than a four in ten chance of being accepted on to a course compared with 74% of white females that were accepted. It would be interesting to drill down into these figures to see whether there are regional and subject/phase differences within the categories.  

My assumption would be that London courses perform well in terms of acceptance of ethnic minority candidates and those courses in regions furthest from the capital may attract few applicants from ethnic groups other than the White group. This can pose another issue if a few courses receive the bulk of say Black African Male applicants. The policy should be to take the most suitable applicants.

I don’t know how much effort the DfE puts into monitoring these statistics and how they respond to the outcomes? Are civil servants content with the disparity between the different groups or should more work be undertaken to reduce the differences across gender and ethnicity?

Male applicants domiciled in London had one of the lowest acceptance rates overall for me of just 50% of applicants. It would be interesting to cross-tab the domicile by region with ethnicity. By contrast, 86% of women applicants domiciled in the north east appear to have been accepted That seems like a high figure to me and it would be interesting to see how many of these were accepted before say, Christmas. Providers that fill courses quickly can save time and money but such a practice begs the question about whether there should be a closing date for applications to allow more equal chances not determined by how quickly you decide upon teaching as a career.

ITT applications looking good for September

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Compared with January 2020, applications for postgraduate teaching courses through UCAS have increased by almost a quarter based on my analysis of the published January 2021 data.

 Interestingly, the lowest growth rate has been in applications from those potential new graduates aged 21 or less, where the percentage increase has been just 14%. However, this age group still comprises a significant proportion of the overall total. The biggest increase has been in the group aged 24, where the increase on 2020 is some 32%. It was almost as high, at 29%, in the 30-39 age group. This suggest that new graduates are not yet seeing teaching as a safe haven in a stormy sea, whereas older graduates, perhaps either furloughed or even made redundant, are considering teaching as a career choice in greater numbers than in recent years.

There are regional differences in the increase in applications, with the North East, where teaching jobs are always in short supply, witnessing an increase of only nine percent in applicants. London, with the most active graduate labour market, has seen an increase on 2020 of 39%, from 2,320 in January 2020 to 3,220 in January 2021.

 Compared with previous upturns in applications to train to teach, this year has seen a different trend to that in the past, with a 27% increase in the number of applications for secondary courses compared with just a 24% increase in applications for primary courses. In the past, the growth in the number of applications for primary courses has often exceeded that for secondary courses.

There remains far more interest in postgraduate apprenticeships in the primary sector than in the secondary sector, although even here numbers are low, and have not offset the decline in applications for School Direct Salaried places in the primary sector.

The higher education sector has seen a smaller increase in applications in the primary sector than either SCITT or School Direct fee courses, although overall there are still more applications for higher education based primary courses than for any other route.

In the secondary sector, there is less of a gap between the increases seen by the different routes, with higher education applications up by a quarter; SCITT applications increasing by 30% and School Direct Salaried courses increasing by 47% on January 2020, albeit from a very low base. School Direct fee courses experienced the smallest increase in applications, at only 24%. To some extent, these changes in applications in the secondary sector are driven by the mix of subjects applicants are seeking to teach and the availability of courses with place still available.

Among the main secondary subjects the number of applications shown as ‘placed’, ‘conditional placed’ or ‘holding offer’ is up on last January in most subjects. Exceptions are biology and geography, where for both subjects the total is down on the January 2020 number. For geography, this may be due to very high levels of offers in recent years leading to over-supply. In biology, with more applications for chemistry and physics, providers may not see the need to be as generous as in past years with offers to biology courses in order to ensure a sufficient supply of science teachers.

In physics, mathematics, design and technology, chemistry and business studies, the offers are at high levels than for any January since before January 2014. However, in design and technology, it is doubtful, even at this level, whether the required number of trainees will be recruited to satisfy the labour market in 2022. There must also be a doubt about the final outcome for physics numbers

Next month marks the point in the annual cycle where predications about the outcome can be made, based upon past trends, can normally be made with some degree of accuracy. Whether that will be the case this year, I am not sure, but check back in a month’s time to see what I say.

NfER review ITT landscape

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The recent review of the ITT landscape in terms of changes in applicant numbers and challenges facing the sector post the start of the pandemic is a welcome addition to the literature on this important area of policy. https://www.nfer.ac.uk/media/4143/the_impact_of_covid_19_on_initial_teacher_training.pdf

Regular readers will be reassured that, for the most part, the NfER report validates and expands upon the information already provided by this blog each month when the UCAS data are published. The additional information on placements and possible retention scenarios is to be welcomed. It is always welcoming to have my work backed up, if not endorsed, by such an important research body as the NfER.

Missing for the NfER paper appears to be any discussion about how the DfE ought now to handle the question of recruitment incentives in the current market? Should these be scaled back either to just those subjects where 2020 numbers miss the Teacher Supply Model projection of need or should they be abolished completely, especially if the NfER’s projections on retention are realistic? Indeed, should the DfE go further and impose recruitment controls on some subjects, at least for the first part of the 2021 recruitment round? It would have been interesting to have seen these policy issues aired in the paper.

At the APPG conference call yesterday, Lord Jim Knight of the TES suggested that the international school market might be more buoyant than the home market for teachers. Will demand from schools overseas attract those teachers currently without teaching posts, and thus absorb some of the over-supply in the market at present or will the risk be seen by young teachers are unacceptable in the present climate?

The DfE will have more data once it has let the contract for the survey of teachers. But, action may be necessary sooner rather than later if there is an early surge in applications for places on the 2021 teacher preparation courses through both UCAs and Teach First. I think we can assume that School Direct salaried as a training route has withered on the vine to a point where the very future of the route must be in doubt.

It is worth remembering that middle and senior leadership positions will be filled from the current stock of teachers. With several years of under-recruitment of new teachers in many subjects, and an increase in departure rates from the teaching profession, some middle leadership positions may remain a challenge to fill even when there are plenty of applicants for classroom teacher positions.

In the past, this situation has resulted in some teachers being required to take on middle leadership roles, often in challenging schools, too early in their careers. The DfE must be alert for this possible scenario to reappear, and work to prevent it. Making sure middle leadership preparation CPD is available is a prerequisite.

Managing primary head teacher vacancies is also an issue that should be on the DfE’s agenda. There are signs of pressure here resulting from the pandemic and pressures on workload of senior staff.