Covid bounce ending for ITT?

Posted on July 1, 2021 by John Howson

The June data from UCAS for ITT applications and outcomes were released earlier today. Applications are still on the increase, but there are definite signs that the bounce in applications teaching courses received after covid first hit in the spring of 2020 may be tailing off.

Primary applications are almost back to the level last seen in 2016/17, and might have exceeded that number had more courses still been looking for the final few applicants to fill their places. In the secondary sector, as this blog has hinted over recent months, the picture is more nuanced. There are plenty of applications for history and physical education and sufficient offers of all types in these subjects to ensure the training places will be easily filled again this year. At the other end of the scale, design and technology has made fewer offers than at any time in the past decade for June. How much longer can this subject survive without an influx of new staff able to teach the range of topics within this portmanteau subject?

Art and design numbers will undoubtedly help out in providing design and technology teachers, and it is hoped that some applicants can be diverted between the two subjects. English, mathematics, religious education and music should provide sufficient trainees to fill the available places unless there is any surge of late dropouts. Chemistry and biology should also be in a satisfactory position for trainees. However, computing, geography and modern foreign languages continue to experience issues with the number of offers they seem to be able to make this year. Finally, business studies, although experiencing a better than average year, may not attract enough trainees to provide the teachers schools will be seeking in the subject next year.

As reported last month, applications for teaching are weak in the North East and relatively buoyant tin London and the South East, where demand for teachers is strongest. Applications from men have just topped the 12,000 mark, but are only about 1,300 more than in 2019 across both the primary and secondary sectors. School Direct salaried numbers continue to be low. No doubt some of these possible places have been replaced by the slowly growing apprenticeship numbers.

Some 80% of applicants from the youngest age group of 21 and under have been offer a place of one type or another. Although the percentage is slightly down on this point last year, it is still a significant figure. This year, there are still fewer applicants in the 40+ age category than in June last year, down by just fewer than 200 applicants, but worthy of note if this is a trend.

With courses starting to announce closure dates for the summer, it seems likely that there will be little change in the outcomes between now and when courses commence in September. On the evidence of these figures, and those of last month, I am concerned about the possible picture for 2022 applications and thus the problems schools will face recruiting for 2023. We may well again experience a teacher shortage in some secondary subjects, if not across the board in the secondary sector. I have few concerns for the primary sector.

Job market still patchy

Posted on June 23, 2021 by John Howson

How easy have teachers looking for jobs this year found the labour market? The following table, taken from TeachVac data www.teachvac.co.uk for vacancies recorded between 1^st January and yesterday in the secondary sector for schools across England suggests demand is still below that witnessed in 2019 in many key subjects.

Subject	2019	2021	Percentage +/- (The nearest whole %)
Art	978	795	-19%
Business	840	842	+0%
Classics	97	108	+11%
Computer Science	1263	1237	-2%
Dance	92	61	-34%
Drama	496	435	-12%
DT	1812	1870	+3%
Economics	370	355	-4%
Engineering	57	74	+30%
English	4159	3028	-27%
Geography	1342	1149	-14%
Health and Social Care	167	190	+14%
History	1054	914	-13%
Humanities	417	337	-19%
Law	42	57	+36%
Mathematics	4712	3669	-22%
Media Studies	176	109	-38%
MFL	2125	1990	-6%
Music	886	796	-10%
Pastoral	259	214	-17%
PE	1383	1178	-15%
Philosophy	68	60	-12%
Psychology	307	441	+44%
RE	809	909	+12%
Science	5642	4245	-25%
–Biology	401	368	-8%
–Chemistry	515	427	-17%
–Physics	647	552	-15%
SEN	324	513	+58%
Sociology	124	169	+36%
Total	30001	25745	-14%

TeachVac http://www.teachvac.co.uk analysis of teacher vacancies in 2021

Now, in some cases this may be because a better supply position, with more new teachers exiting preparation courses this year, resulting in fewer re-advertisements by schools. Without a dedicated job reference code – something I have been advocating for years – it is difficult to distinguish unfilled vacancies re-advertised from new vacancies except in specific categories such as a head of department or headteacher posts, where there is only one such post.

Nevertheless, the reduction in vacancies for mathematics teachers of 22%, and for science teachers of 25% does suggest a better balanced labour market than in 2019, when schools were suffering from the recruitment into training problems experienced in 2018. Interestingly, despite the fall in the birth rate, demand for teachers for the primary sector is buoyant this year.

One unknown, going forward, is how the global school market will respond to the pandemic over the next twelve months and whether or not teachers from England will once again be attracted to teach overseas in any significant numbers. Will there also be fewer EEA citizens willing and able to teach in England? Time will tell.

Still, at this point in time, schools can feel reasonably confident of filling late vacancies for September 2021 and vacancies for January 2022 in mot subjects in many parts of the country. There will be local shortages, but apart from some vocationally orientated subjects such as business studies and design ad technology, nationwide issues are unlikely to surface.

Demand for teachers

Posted on June 19, 2021 by John Howson

How is demand for teachers shaping up so far in 2021 now that schools are returning to what might be described as the new ‘post-modern’ normal?

An examination of weekly vacancies this year compared with the past three years data conducted by TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk has concluded that demand remains weak for teachers of:

Physical Education

History

Geography

Art

Mathematics

English

And Science overall, although demand for some specific subjects remains stronger.

Compared with pre-pandemic levels.

Over the past few weeks, demand has been strengthening for teachers of music (after a weak start to the year) and teachers of languages.

Demand remains strong for teachers of:

Religious Education

Business Studies

IT/Computing

Demand for teachers of Design and Technology is at record levels.

Some of the weakness in demand in Mathematics may be attributable to a better level of supply requiring fewer re-advertisements. Conversely, some of the increased demand for Design and Technology teachers may be due to increased levels of re-advertisements as schools struggle to find suitable candidates.

In terms of the location of vacancies, the South East region has witnessed the greatest demand from schools so far in 2021 whereas the North East region is still the part of England where jobs are hardest to find.

Vacancies are now reducing across all categories, as the summer holidays approach. The likely overall number of vacancies for 2021 is going to be somewhere between 55,000 to 60,000 as recorded vacancies by TeachVac. Up on last year, but unlikely to match the record level seen in 2019, when demand outpaced supply in many subjects across the year as a whole.

With reports that the independent sector has recorded a decline in pupil numbers, presumably due to a reduction in overseas students, any recovery in that sector will likely increase demand for teachers in 2022.

Free School Meals and staff turnover

Posted on May 31, 2021 by John Howson

Is the level of Free School Meals (FSM) recorded by a school reflected in the level of staff turnover? Do secondary schools with the highest FSM percentages record more staff turnover than schools with relatively low percentage of pupils on Free School Meals?

TeachVac can compare its data on vacancies to date in 2021 with the DfE’s published information on Free School Meals. The end of May normally marks the point where most schools have completed their staffing for September, and existing staff have reached the point where they may resign at the endo of this school year.

As a result, it was relatively easy to look at TeachVac’s vacancy data for the period form 1^st January up to Friday 28^th May and compare staff turnover against the percentage of pupils on Free School Meals. However, staff turnover is affected by a number of features. A new school may have relatively few pupils, but be adding staff as the school grows in size. Schools in different areas vary in size, with some schools of over 2,000 pupils and some schools in rural areas with only around 500 pupils, and no post-16 provision.

In order to take account of school size, the number of pupils on roll was divided by the recorded number of vacancies recorded by TeachVac. Thus, a school with 1,000 pupils and 5 vacancies between January and May would create an index figure of 200, whereas a similar size school with 10 vacancies would have recorded an index figure of 100. The lower the index number, the greater the turnover of staff.

This method doesn’t take account of growing schools, so it could be possible for a school with few pupils on Free School meals to still record a low index score if it was growing in size. The absence of a vacancy identifying number also complicated the issue because repeat advertisements may possibly being recorded. TeachVac does its best to eliminate such adverts.

An analysis was conducted into the outcomes in terms of recorded vacancies during the first five months of 2021 for secondary schools across the West Midlands region whose data was captured by TeachVac. The region contains rural areas such as most of the county of Herefordshire and urban areas such as Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Coventry.

The first look at the TeachVac data suggests that for schools with a Free School Meal percentage of less than 20% there is little difference in the index score. The majority of schools had a score of 300 or less, suggesting relatively high levels of vacancies regardless of the percentage of pupils on Free School Meals.

For schools with Free School Meals above 20% of the school population there was a trend towards schools with higher FSM percentages having a higher turnover index score. 16 of the 20 schools recorded with a FSM percentage above 40% had turnover indexes below 250 per pupil, and most of these schools had an index of below 200 per pupil.

One caveat must be that 2021 is not a ‘normal’ recruitment cycle. In some schools there has been an element of ‘catch-up’ in recruitment following the period between March and September 2020 when most teacher recruitment slowed to almost a complete halt. It would be possible to compare the 2021 data with that for 2018 and 2019 in order to see whether there has been a ‘covid’ effect and if certain schools have been more affected? There may also be both a rural and small school effect. As some parts of the West Midlands still have selective schools that is another variable that needs consideration.

Nevertheless, this quick first look at the data from one region does raise questions about teacher supply and the issue of policy towards ‘leveling up’. Can a market-based approach to teacher supply create the improvements in outcomes for pupils if schools with high levels of Free School Meals if such schools are finding staff recruitment more of a challenge than their neighbours with lower percentages of Free School Meals?

ITT: hiccup not a change in direction?

Posted on May 27, 2021 by John Howson

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.

Bounce back

Posted on May 16, 2021 by John Howson

Data from TeachVac www.teachvac.co.uk suggests that vacancies for teachers in schools in England are up by 47% between 1^st April and 14^th May this year when compared with the same period in 2020. Of course, that was the period at the height of the first lockdown. The increase for primary sector vacancies is even more dramatic: up by 95% from 2,770 in April and early May last year to 5,413 this year.

In the secondary sector, demand is up, but in subjects such as art, but only around two per cent. In the key curriculum subjects of the English Baccalaureate the increase is in the range of 20-30%, although IT vacancies are up by 34%, and those for languages by 38%. Interestingly, the increase for mathematics is only 17%. This may be down to the need for fewer re-advertisements than in past years as existing teacher stay put and more of those training to be teachers actually opt to enter the classroom.

However, it is not all good news. TeachVac has ‘red’ warning out for business studies and design and technology. This means schools anywhere in England, but especially in the South East and London areas, could experience challenges if trying to recruit teachers in these subjects. The same challenge will apply for physics but, as most science posts are advertised as general science vacancies, it is not possible to quantify exactly the extent of the problem. Teachers may apply for either specific physics posts or those for a ‘science’ teacher.

Although demand in the London area is weaker than in recent years it is still higher than in many parts of England. At present, the South East Region is the region with the greatest demand for teachers. Yorkshire and The Humber Region is the area north of London where vacancy rates are at their highest in the secondary sector.

Part of the reason for the level of demand in the South East is the high number if private schools. Demand for teachers from those schools appears to be holding up well.

On the basis of the evidence from the 34,000 vacancies for teachers identified so far in 2021, the demand for teachers is once again going to become an issue in parts of England by 2023. It will be important to track the level of interest in teaching as a career over the next few months and compare it with the same period last year. If a decline in those likely to be career changers is not matched by increased interest from new graduates, then that will be an early warning sign for policymakers.

The other ‘unknown’ is workings of the international school market for teachers, and its impact on the market in England. Will there be a flood or returning teachers from say China, Hong Kong and the Middle East or will demand hold up and fresh demand take more teachers out of the home market? Only time will tell.

Teacher Shortages in 2022?

Posted on April 29, 2021 by John Howson

The present satisfactory state of recruitment into teacher training looks likely to be short-lived if the messages from this month’s UCAS data are interpreted in a particular way. After almost 30 years of looking at either weekly or monthly data on applications and acceptances, one can start to discern trends and patterns. Covid threw a spanner in the works of what was an emerging teacher supply crisis. Has that spanner now been retrieved?

One the one hand, applicant numbers are still up on last year. The increase is just over 5,000 for those with a domicile in England, from 26,280 in April 2020 to 31,460 this April. Interestingly, there has been virtually no increase in applicants from the North East, but a large increase in applicants domiciled in the London region. This should be good news, as it is in London that there is a strong demand for teachers.

More worrying is the relative lack of interest from new graduates in teaching as a career. There are only around 700 more new young graduates 21 or under this year compared with the same time in 2020, whereas there are 1,300 more in the 25-29 age group. Career changers, perhaps furloughed or made redundant by the pandemic, seem more interested in teaching than young new graduates. Indeed, there are only 60 more male applicants in the youngest new graduate age group than this time last year. A trickle rather than a flood.

The most worrying number is the drop in applications for design and technology, from 970 in April last year to 880 this April. In April 2019 it was 950, so the decline must be of concern. Applications to train as a languages teachers are also weak when compared with previous years. However, the increase in applications to train as a mathematics teachers from 5,390 last April to 7,450 this year is good news, as ARK noted in their recent ITT bulletin.

The bizarre over-recruitment of both history and PE teachers continues, with 1,500 offers in PE and 1,230 in history. This compares with 380 offers in physics, 230 in design and technology and 330 in computing.

School Direct Salaried as a route continues to decline, whereas School Direct non-salaried continues to grow, if not to thrive. Higher Education has done well in attracting applications for primary courses, up from less than 14,000 to over 18,000 this year. The increase is slightly less for secondary phase courses. Apprenticeships have taken up some of the slack from the School Direct Salaried route, but offers in the secondary sector remain derisory at this point in the cycle.

So, there will be problems in 2022 recruiting design and technology teachers, physics teachers and probably business studies teachers as well, but a glut of history and PE teachers in most parts of England. This blog will look at the likely outcomes in other subjects once the trends of the next couple of months become apparent. We don’t expect a big rush into teaching unless new graduates suddenly discover there are no jobs elsewhere and turn to teaching once their courses have finished and they finally have a degree.

UCAS end of 2020 cycle ITT data

Posted on April 8, 2021 by John Howson

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
	Male	Female	All
Black	37%	53%	48%
Other	41%	51%	48%
Asian	50%	61%	58%
Not Stated	55%	57%	56%
Mixed [sic]	58%	62%	61%
Total	63%	70%	68%
White	67%	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: not all plain sailing

Posted on March 25, 2021 by John Howson

Normally during a downturn in the economy, and the associated rise in unemployment, teaching does well as a career choice, and applications for places on graduate teacher preparation courses surge; they only peak when the labour market shows signs of picking up again.

The trend during the pandemic of the past year has been slightly different to this pattern. Yes, overall applications, and applicant numbers are up, as commentators that just look at the overall numbers have noted. However, for those more concerned with the details, the picture is more nuanced.

In primary, applications have not yet reached the peak seen in the 2016/17 round, and are some 5,000 or so below that level, and only 8,000 applications above the low point reached in March 2020 before the full extent of the current pandemic had become clear. There may be a warning here about the desirability of becoming a primary school teacher among the group that society has relied upon to ensure an intake of high quality new teachers each year. The public data doesn’t allow for any further comments, but someone should be taking a look at the detailed data.

It is in the secondary sector that the outcome is more nuanced. Three subjects stand out for concern. In biology, overall applications are down on March 2020, by around a thousand, to 2,360. While there will be plenty of chemistry trainees this year, with applications double what they were in March 2020, physics, as a subject, seems unlikely that it will meet its target for the year unless applications pick up in the second half of the year. As a result, any shortfall in biology may leave school struggling for science teachers for September 2022, if demand return to more normal levels next year.

In geography, applications are down by around 300 this year on last, meaning offer levels are not much above the low levels seen seven and eight years ago. However, with ever more history trainees competing for jobs, schools will be able to replace geography teachers with humanities teachers. Whether their quality of subject knowledge will be acceptable is an issue for others to debate.

Design and technology, the ‘ugly duckling’ and neglected child of the school curriculum is a real and serious concern. Applications by mid-March were just 760, compared with 820 at the same point in 2020. That’s application and not applicants. As a result, offer levels are at their lowest point for March for any year in the last decade.

I would content that design and technology is an important subject, and the DfE needs to address where the future stock of teachers is to come from? An urgent look at the details of applicants and why only 190 offers have been made is needed. In reality, this could be a few as 100 actual applicants offered places on design and technology ITT courses by mid-March.

Nearly half of the growth in applicants can be found in the London and South East regions. Whether this means that some rebalancing of ITT places might be required, as these are the two regions with the greatest demand for teachers, is no doubt a matter for active discussion. It would be foolhardy to leave places unfilled in other parts of the country whilst turning away acceptable applicants from London, especially as London often produces a higher percentage of BAME trainees than other parts of England.

Next month the blog will consider the different routes into teaching, and how they are faring and also revisit the issue of the age profile of applicants.

More good news: but not for all

Posted on February 25, 2021 by John Howson

Regular readers of this blog will know that the last Thursday of the month is the day that UCAS provides updated details of applications to postgraduate teacher preparation courses managed through their system. The numbers for February mark the half way point in the cycle between course commencements and thus represents a good time to make a judgement on what is happening in the marketplace for trainee teachers.

It is not surprising that with the economy facing the challenges resulting from the covid-19 pandemic that teaching appears a more interesting profession to pursue for graduates than when unemployment is low, and the economy is booming. However, there are not similar outcomes across the whole gamut of subjects.

This blog has used as a measure the number of applications classified as falling into one of three categories ‘Placed’, ‘Conditional Place’ or ‘Holding offer’. This is a more refined measure than using the gross total of applications, not least because each candidate can make several applications.

The news this month is that the numbers in these three categories are generally well above those for February in recent years. However, there are some exceptions to this general observation.

In geography, biology and design and technology numbers in these categories are below the same level seen last year. Geography suffered from over-recruitment a couple of years ago, and numbers placed and holding offers have been controlled more carefully since then.

Now applications for places in biology and physics courses are on the increase, there is less incentive to recruit large numbers of biology trainees, so caution here is understandable. Design and Technology is a subject that regularly struggles to fill places, and the current nature of the pandemic may not have produced large numbers of potential teachers in this subject area.

Although applicant numbers are increasing, there has not really been a surge. Compared with February 2020, there are some 4,300 more applicants this year. These additional applicants are spread across the country, although 1,100 are domiciled in London and a further 1,200 in the South East, leaving the remainder to be spread across the remaining regions.

Applications are up from those in all age-groups, including both career changers and new graduates, producing little shift in the percentage composition of applicants by age-group compared with last year.

The inclusion of a gender category of ‘unknown or Prefer not to say’ makes annual comparison on this factor impossible, but it seems likely that there has been little change and perhaps that men have even lost a little ground on women in percentage terms.

In terms of routes into teaching, School Direct (Salaried) remains the big loser in the number of applications, especially in the primary sector. All other routes seem to have benefited, although the rate of offering places on the Apprenticeship route seems to be slow when compared to other routes. In view of the government’s plans for teachers, the higher education sector remains resilient, and is still the choice for more applications than any other route into teaching.

As places fill, we can expect applications to reduce. However, of more interest is how the wider graduate labour market will recover from the pandemic and what effect that recovery will have on applications to teacher preparation courses.

John Howson

Education and the numbers that affect what happens

Tag Archives: teacher supply