NPQ participants 2025-26
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Published
Last updated
The number NPQ starts and unique participants, the total teaching workforce and the percentage of the teaching workforce undertaking a NPQ, broken down by funding, course type and individual and school characteristics.
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Data set details
- Theme
- Teachers and school workforce
- Publication
- Teacher and leader development: ECTE and NPQs
- Release
- Academic year 2025/26
- Release type
- Number of rows
- 3,450
- Geographic levels
- Local authority, National, Regional
- Indicators
- NPQ leadership workforce share
- NPQ participants
- NPQ participants SWC matched
- Filters
- Funding
- Group name
- Time period
- 2021/22 to 2025/26
Data set preview
| time_period | time_identifier | geographic_level | country_code | country_name | region_code | region_name | la_name | old_la_code | new_la_code | funding | breakdown | group_name | npq_starts | npq_unique_participants | npq_unique_participants_swc_eligible | percent_workforce_npq_participation | npq_leaders | percent_leaders_npq_participation | teaching_workforce_headcount_swc |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 202122 | Academic year | National | E92000001 | England | Overall | Overall | Overall | 30550 | 30388 | 27848 | 5.5 | 6608 | 9.3 | 510265 | |||||
| 202223 | Academic year | National | E92000001 | England | Overall | Overall | Overall | 37200 | 37019 | 32143 | 6.3 | 7267 | 10.2 | 511860 | |||||
| 202324 | Academic year | National | E92000001 | England | Overall | Overall | Overall | 42179 | 41954 | 36181 | 7.1 | 7832 | 11 | 511951 | |||||
| 202425 | Academic year | National | E92000001 | England | Overall | Overall | Overall | 27451 | 27333 | 23218 | 4.5 | 5593 | 7.8 | 511952 | |||||
| 202526 | Academic year | National | E92000001 | England | Overall | Overall | Overall | 18926 | 18740 | 15917 | 3.1 | 3957 | 5.4 | 511557 |
Variables in this data set
| Variable name | Variable description |
|---|---|
| funding | Funding |
| group_name | Group name |
| npq_leaders | NPQ participants at leadership grade |
| npq_starts | NPQ starts |
| npq_unique_participants | NPQ participants |
Footnotes
- The breakdown for academies also includes free schools.
- The appearance of 'z' in the table indicates that the metric is not applicable to this category. This could be as no teachers in this group appear in the School Workforce Census for this category, or for retention, not enough time has passed to be able to look at the two-year figure.
- The 'Other' category includes all-through schools covering nursery, primary, and secondary levels.
- Some independent special schools are eligible for NPQ funding under Section 41 of the Children and Families Act 2014. These schools are included in the 'special schools' category
- The ‘Other types’ category includes city technology colleges, further education establishments, sixth form centres, special post-16 institutions and universities. It also includes non-maintained special schools and some independent special schools eligible for funding under Section 41 of the Children and Families Act 2014.
- The appearance of 'low' in the table denotes that the data has rounded to 0 but is not 0.
- Pupil premium decile is a measure of disadvantage. A school is allocated funding for pupils that meet the pupil premium criteria (opens in new tab). Data is collected on the percentage of pupils within each school that qualify. In this publication we look at the decile split of schools in terms of this pupil premium percentage.
- The appearance of 'c' in the table indicates that the data has been suppressed due to low counts.
- NPQ starts are the total number of NPQ course starts, with each start counted separately, including multiple starts by the same teacher. NPQ participants are the total number of teachers who started at least one NPQ, with each teacher counted only once.
- NPQ starts in international schools are not included. See the methodology note for more detail.
- NPQ leaders are participants whose grade is deputy headteacher, assistant headteacher, or headteacher. Leadership workforce share refers to the number of leaders who have taken an NPQ as a proportion of all leaders in the workforce
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Contact us
If you have a specific enquiry about NPQ participants 2025-26 statistics and data:
Continuous Professional Development (CPD) Analysis Team
Email: Jay.KHAMIS@EDUCATION.GOV.UKContact name: Mr Jay Khamis