Academic year 2023/24

Further education and skills

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See all updates (10) for Academic year 2023/24

  1. Updated to add links to the interactive data visualisation tool

  2. Updated with final data covering August 2023 to July 2024

  3. Minor update to add additional achievement rate data by provider type and learning aim title.

  4. Updated to add links to the interactive data visualisation tool

  5. Updated with data covering the first three quarters of 2023/24

  6. Minor update to improve usability of some data files and added Local Skills Improvement Plan (LSIP) areas to summary geography

  7. Minor update to improve usability of some data files

  8. Updated to add links to the interactive data visualisation tool

  9. Updated with data covering the first two quarters of 2023/24. Achievement rate data also added covering 2022/23

  10. Updated to add links to the interactive data visualisation tool

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Introduction

This release shows full year data on adult (19+) further education (FE) and skills in England reported for the academic year 2023/24 (August 2023 to July 2024) based on final data returned by providers in October 2024. This includes apprenticeships in the overall FE and skills numbers, but for detailed statistics relevant to apprenticeships and traineeships please see the ‘Apprenticeships release’. 

Changes in this release

We have corrected an error in previously published data which affects total 19+ achievements by level 2 and below level 2.  Participation, total achievements and other estimates such as those for essential skills achievements are unaffected.

We have also revised the volumes of those participating in essential skills in English and digital skills to correct an error where a small number of non-regulated learning aims were classified as English instead of digital.  

All time series have been revised accordingly. For further details please see the about these statistics section.

Future changes to the structure of the release

We are intending to make changes to this release from January 2025 and we invite users to feedback on what aspects they find most useful. Please use our contact details at end of the release to get in touch.

The 2024/25 academic year introduces new funding rules under the Adult Skills Fund and other changes such as replacing Community Learning (CL) with tailored learning, which incorporates other non-regulated learning not previously categorised under CL. This causes a discontinuity to the time series meaning our long-running Education and Training, and CL series will no longer be possible for 2024/25. To continue to provide insight on 19+ FE provision and offer continuity where possible with these changes, we intend to make changes to what we classify under Education and Training along with other presentational changes for new provision. For further details and how to provide feedback please see the about these statistics section.

Please note that the ‘Explore data and files’ section contains the underlying files  and featured tables that underpin this release. You can also view featured tables or create your own table using the ‘create your own tables' functionality.

Related information

Releases in this series

View releases (10) for Further education and skills

Methodologies

Headline facts and figures - 2023/24

Explore data and files used in this release

  • View or create your own tables

    View tables that we have built for you, or create your own tables from open data using our table tool

  • Data catalogue

    Browse and download open data files from this release in our data catalogue

  • Data guidance

    Learn more about the data files used in this release using our online guidance

  • Download all data (ZIP)

    Download all data available in this release as a compressed ZIP file

Additional supporting files

All supporting files from this release are listed for individual download below:

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View related dashboard(s)

The interactive data visualisation tool (opens in a new tab) has been developed to complement the Further education and skills statistics.

The tool provides an interactive presentation of Education & Training and Community Learning data, which allows users to investigate the data by level, subject, provider, learner characteristics and geographical area.

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About these statistics

This statistical release presents information on adult (19+) FE and skills participation and achievements in England for the 2023/24 academic year (covering August 2023 to July 2024).

The data includes Apprenticeships, Community Learning, and Education and Training provision taken at General Further Education Colleges (including Tertiary), Sixth Form Colleges, Special Colleges (Agricultural and Horticultural Colleges, and Art and Design Colleges), Specialist Colleges and External Institutions.

A separate release covers apprenticeships data, please see ‘Apprenticeships release’, but note that apprenticeships are included in the overall FE and skills numbers in this release.

Individualised Learner Record (ILR) administrative data

The ILR is an administrative data collection system designed primarily for operational use in order to fund training providers for learners in FE and on apprenticeship programmes. We publish a high volume of FE statistics using provisional, in year data and use latest data as soon as available despite not being ‘final’. This enables us to provide the earliest picture of FE performance and allows users to assess the impact of government-funded provision and hold the ‘system’ to account.

The FE and skills data in this release are based on the final ILR data return from FE and apprenticeship providers for the 2023/24 academic year, which was taken in October 2024.

Quarterly release schedule:

  • Quarter 1: Data from August to October published in January
  • Quarter 2: Data from August to January published in March
  • Quarter 3: Data from August to April published in July
  • Full Year: Data from August to July published in November

Note: The academic year in the FE publications covers August to July.

National achievement rate tables data

Figures in the ‘national achievement rate tables’ section are as published in March 2024. These official statistics cover achievement rates for the 2022/23 academic year and would have been previously released as part of the standalone National achievement rate tables publication.

Changes in this release

Correction to estimates of level 2 and below level 2 achievements

We have corrected a coding error on GCSE passes affecting the timeseries of 19+ achievement volumes for level 2 and below level 2. In the 2022/23 academic year this reduces the number of adult learners achieving a level 2 in Education and Training by approximately 3.6%, from the previously reported figure of 319,220 down to 307,720. All time series have been revised accordingly and users should no longer refer to previous releases. The impact on the time series varies between 2.5% and 3.9% since 2017/18. Achievement volumes presented elsewhere in the release for all 19+ provision in English and Maths are unaffected by this error.

Essential Skills

In addition, the volumes of essential skills have been revised to allow for a small number of non-regulated learning aims previously being incorrectly classified in LARS as English instead of essential digital skills.  The table below shows the estimate of change for 19+ participation volumes at level 2 for Further Education and Skills for the academic year 2022/23.  Please note that the increase in essential digital skills does not equal the decrease in English because estimates of participation de-duplicate where learners enter multiple aims within the same classification. All time series have been revised accordingly and users should no longer refer to previous releases. 

Previously reportedNew estimateDifference%
English222,990218,080-4,910-2.2%
Essential Digital Skills17,51022,2204,71026.9%

Future changes to this release

  • The 2024/25 academic year introduces new funding rules under the Adult Skills Fund and other changes such as replacing Community Learning (CL) with tailored learning, which incorporates other non-regulated learning not previously categorised under CL. This causes a discontinuity to the time series meaning our long-running Education and Training, and CL series will no longer be possible for 2024/25.
  • Our proposal to incorporate these changes and continue to offer overarching time series where possible is to extend our classification of Education and Training to incorporate Tailored learning (that replaces Community Learning) along with all other non-regulated provision. Our classification of 19+ Further Education and Skills will therefore just reflect the extended coverage of Education and Training and Apprenticeships.
  • We will continue to provide the same level of detail and breakdowns for Education and Training, though volumes will increase largely by the level of provision now delivered under tailored learning.  Estimates of Further Education and Skills will remain unchanged.
  • We will also continue to provide insight on the different types of provision under Education and Training.  Likewise, we will seek to present the same types of tables we currently present for community learning for provision on tailored learning based on the funding code.  We will also introduce an overarching non-regulated aims section to provide a consistent time series of all such provision.   
  • We welcome feedback on what aspects of the release users find most useful to help make this change as useful to users as possible. Please use our contact details at end of the release to get in touch.
  • As mentioned above, in practice the headlines and tables presenting counts of adult Further Education and Skills (FES) will not change as we continue to incorporate all that is included now. Nor would there be any change to how we present any apprenticeship data in this release or within the dedicated apprenticeship release.

Provider reporting during the COVID-19 pandemic

Historic data in this publication covers periods affected by varying COVID-19 restrictions which will have impacted on further education including apprenticeship learning. Therefore, extra care should be taken in comparing and interpreting data presented in this release. It is likely to have impacted on provider behaviour in terms of the reporting of FE and apprenticeship learning during the affected period, and this could vary by provider.

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How to find data and featured tables in this release

The content of the publication contains charts and tables which highlight key figures and trends that give an overview of the national picture.

At relevant points within each commentary section there are links to “featured tables” that offer the next level of detail behind each of the tables embedded within the release. The table builder tool “featured tables” sit within, also enables the user to amend content, reorder and take away to meet their needs.

The user can also choose just to explore the data within this release by using the 'Explore data and files used in this release' section. Here the user can either select “view or create your own tables” to view all of the ready-made “featured tables” in a single list, or build their own table by selecting a datafile that underpins the release, or use one of the featured tables as a starting point.

There is also a dashboard that provides interactive presentation of our published data, with a number of different views on to data and ‘drilldown’ capability to allow users to investigate different types of FE provision. It is particularly helpful in viewing data across different geographical areas and providers. See the Interactive data visualisation tool accordion for the dashboard link.

This release also contains an ‘Additional supporting files’ accordion containing mainly csv files that can be downloaded, which provide some additional breakdowns including unrounded data. They are provided for transparency to enable analysts to re-use the data in this release. A metadata document is available in the same location which explains the content of these supporting files. Please note some of the files are too large for proprietary software such as Excel and may need specialist analysis software such as R, SQL, etc.

Feedback

We continually look to improve our data and statistics and your feedback is important to help us further improve and develop. To provide feedback on this release, please email us at FE.OFFICIALSTATISTICS@education.gov.uk.

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Full year Further Education and Skills data

The figures in this section cover adult (19+) further education and skills and relate to full-year final data up to and including the 2023/24 academic year, originally published in November 2024. This is a summary of all adult further education activity including Apprenticeships, Community Learning, and Education and Training provision.

Type of further education

Adult participation in further education and skills has declined in the last decade. From the most recent peak of nearly 3.3 million learners in 2012/13, participation fell to 1.6 million in 2020/21. However, the last three academic years have seen a reverse of this trend with participation rising to 1.7 million in 2021/22 and then 1.8 million in 2022/23; with a further 0.7% increase in 2023/24.

Education and training, the largest component of FE & Skills participation, has shown a similar pattern, declining to 870,000 in 2020/21 from nearly 1.8 million in 2012/13 before rising to 954,000 in 2022/23 and then 992,000 in 2023/24 (a 4.0% increase).

Participation in community learning has seen a steady fall in most years. During the years affected by the pandemic, numbers dropped at a faster rate in 2019/20 and 2020/21, with recovery seen in 2021/22 and 2022/23. There was a small reduction in participation of 1.6% in 2023/24.

Further education and skills participation has changed over the years and has included different types of provision, including Apprenticeships, Community Learning, and Education and Training. Some provision and data sources are now more historical in nature such Workplace Learning (which had around 455,000 adults participating in 2011/12, dropping to 59,000 in the last year of reporting in 2015/16) and that relating to the Apprenticeship Grant for Employers, as well as data relating to pilots such as the Employer Ownership Pilots. 

Additionally, learners can participate at more than one level in different types of learning during an academic year and also on different types of provision, therefore it is not possible to sum individual levels or strands to obtain the overall total. For more detail on how we count different measures please see the Further education and skills statistics: methodology

Of the 1,830,650 adult learners participating in 2023/24:

  • The number on below Level 2 courses (excluding Essential skills) was 323,560 - up 13.1%.
  • The number on Essential skills English and Maths courses was 412,070 - down 5.4%.
  • The number on Level 2 courses was 519,090 - down 3.6% (on Full Level 2, there were 102,970 learners - down 15.5%).
  • The number on Level 3 courses was 395,480 - down 2.3% (on Full Level 3, there were 290,800 learners - down 5.7%).
  • The number on Level 4 or above courses was 280,210 - up 5.9%.


Adult essential skills

Essential skills volumes have been revised to correct a small number of non-regulated learning aims that were previously classified as English (literacy) instead of digital. 

From 2024/25, we will widen reporting of essential skills and provide a breakdown of participation in regulated qualifications and in non-regulated courses. We will also incorporate some additional non-regulated aims into our totals that have not previously been counted (Community Learning essential skills and other non-formula funded aims in English, maths and ESOL), and include new Tailored Learning essential skills aims going forward. For transparency purposes, we will preserve the historical series as reported in this release, as well as presenting new totals in our 2024/25 outputs. 

Adult essential skills including digital skills participation reported for 2023/24 was 425,890 – a decrease of 4.9% since 2022/23. Of these:

  • Participation on an English course was 195,940, down 10.2% from 2022/23.
  • Participation on a Maths course was 220,500, down 9.0% from 2022/23.
  • Participation on an English for Speakers of Other Languages (ESOL) course was 145,730 - up 0.8%.
  • Participation on an Essential Digital Skills course was 24,120, an increase of 8.5% from 2022/23.

Adult essential skills excluding digital skills participation decreased by 5.4% to 412,070 in 2022/23 compared to 2022/23.


Multiply

Multiply is a government-funded programme, introduced from April 2022, to help adults improve their numeracy skills. It includes both regulated and non-regulated courses up to Level 2.

There were 121,240 total enrolments on Multiply courses in academic year 2023/24 with 89,500 learners participating. There were also 81,080 achievements in 2023/24 (qualifications obtained on regulated courses and completions of non-regulated courses). This is between a 70% to 81% increase across all measures from participation to enrolments respectively, compared to 2022/23.

This does not include any activity not recorded on the Individualised Learner Record (ILR). People who participate in engagement events funded by Multiply do not need to be recorded in the ILR unless they participate in actual courses.

These figures include only learners funded by Multiply. There is a small overlap between these figures and those in the Essential Skills section above which captures participation in Essential Skills courses across all further education and skills provision types - apprenticeships, education and training and community learning.


Demographics

Around three in five learners participating in FE & Skills were female in 2023/24 (59.8%). This share has increased slightly from 59.1% in 2018/19 and has fluctuated around the 60% to 61% mark in the last few years.

The proportion of learners aged 50 and above reduced from 20% in 2018/19 to 14.7% in 2020/21 during the period affected by Covid. This age-group has seen recovery since with participation increasing by over a third from 241,560 in 2020/21 to 326,760 in 2023/24. 

The proportion of learners declaring a learning difficulty or disability has increased to almost one in five (19.5%) in 2023/24, from 18.5% in 2022/23 and is the third consecutive annual increase in the share of LLDD learners from a low of 16.3% in 2020/21. 


Ethnicity

The proportion of learners participating in FE & Skills who are white has declined in recent years. 70.8% of learners were white in 2023/24 compared to 76.5% in 2018/19. 

Over the period 2018/19 to 2023/24:

  • Asian learners increased from 9.8% to 11.9%
  • Black learners increased from 7.4% to 8.6%
  • Learners from mixed/multiple ethnic groups increased from 3% to 4% and
  • Learners from other ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) increased from 3.2% to 4.7%

Since 2022/23, the number of adults participating in FE Skills increased in every major ethnic minority group by at least 6.5% to 2023/24. White learner numbers fell by 2% in the last year.


Learners in receipt of benefits

In 2023/24, the number of adult (19+) learners in receipt of benefits when they started their learning was 318,500. Based on self-reporting through the ILR, these are defined as those learners reporting that they were in receipt of Employment and Support Allowance - Work Related Activity Group (ESA WRAG), Jobseeker's Allowance (JSA) or Universal Credit (if unemployed and looking for work).
 

Further information can be found in the following featured tables : 

Further education and skills participation and achievements by learning difficulty/disability
Further education and skills learner characteristics by sex and ethnicity group
Further education and skills participation by age and IMD quintile
Further education and skills comparisons by provider type and level
Further education and skills comparisons by region
Further education and skills comparisons by sector subject area
Essential skills participation and achievements by subject
AEB - Adult education budget full year comparisons by level
Further education and skills participation and achievements per 100,000 of population by region

A new geography file has been produced containing parliamentary constituency breakdowns based on the new 2024 boundaries. This can be accessed in the following featured table: 

Further education and skills participation by new parliamentary constituencies
Further education and skills participation by level and new parliamentary constituencies
 

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Full year Education and Training data

The figures in this section cover adult (19+) education and training and relate to full-year final data up to and including the 2023/24 academic year, originally published in November 2024.

Subject and Level

Adult participation in Education and training increased by 4.0% to 992,060 compared to 2022/23 but has fallen by 8.5% since 2018/19. Achievements have increased in each of the last four academic years to 783,410 in 2023/24 but remain 11.4% below 2018/19 achievements. 

From 2022/23, participation and achievements in Multiply courses are contributing to these totals for the first time and explain much of the increase seen in the last two academic year (see the 'Full year Further Education and Skills data’ section for further information on enrolments, participation and achievements on the Multiply programme). 

Level 2 courses remain the most popular (422,730 learners participating), followed by Essential skills in English and maths (280,040). There has been a large rise in participation on courses that have no level associated with them – 167,390 in 2023/24 compared to 42,100 in 2021/22. Much of this rise is due to the Multiply programme.

Out of 1,910,840 education and training learning aim enrolments in 2023/24:

  • Science, technology engineering and maths (STEM) subjects represent 15.1% of enrolments where sector subject area is known - an increase from 14.2% in 2022/23. Growth in participation has been seen in all four tier 1 STEM subject areas, particularly in Construction (15.7%) and ICT (13.5%).
  • Just under half of all enrolments (915,620) are in the Preparation for life and work sector subject. Courses in Health, public services and care had the second highest number of enrolments (282,290).
  • The last two years have seen the percentage of courses that have no level assigned increase considerably, rising to 13.3% in 2023/24. This is predominantly driven by enrolments in Multiply courses.
  • Entry and Level 1 courses together make up 48.9% of enrolments – 934,400 in total. The majority of these are in preparation for life and work (72.4%).
  • Level 2 courses account for 28.9% overall (552,230) – a third of which are in health, public services and care (182,860).
  • At Level 4 or above, the largest proportion of enrolments are in health, public services and care (33.0%) followed by Information and Communication Technology (20.9%). Business, administration and law has seen a fall in its share of level 4+ enrolments, dropping from 26.9% in 2020/21 to 14.1% in 2023/24.

Demographics

Of the 992,060 learners participating in adult education and training in 2023/24: 

  • Females account for 61.6% (611,040). The share of female learners has declined in the last few years but is higher than 2018/19, where their share was 58.4%.
  • Learners aged 19-24, 25-49, and 50 and over accounted for 19.7% (195,030), 61.8% (613,370) and 18.5% (183,580) respectively - broadly in line with the previous year.
  • Those declaring a learner learning difficulty and/or disability (LLDD) account for 21.8% (209,510) - a 6.1% increase in volume from the previous year.
  • The proportion of White learners dropped to 62.3% from 64.0% in the previous year. All ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) increased their proportion of education and training participants in consecutive years since 2021/22.

Further information can be found in the following featured tables : 

Education and training participation by provider type
Education and training learner participation and achievement by age
Education and training participation by ethnicity and sex
Education and training learner characteristics by IMD quintile and age
Education and training learner characteristics by LLDD
Education and training participation by English devolved area
Education and training achievements by provider type

Region

The North East consistently has the highest rates of education and training participation among adults when population size is taken into account and the South East and East of England the lowest. The East Midlands has seen a growth in its rate of participation since 2022/23, mainly attributable to learners from the two most deprived IMD quintiles and in courses at Below Level 2 and where no level is assigned.


Advanced Learner Loans

The number of learners participating with an advanced learner loan has fallen year-on-year to 42,210 in 2023/24. 

Of the 42,210 learners participating with an advanced learner loan in 2023/24:

  • Most of the learners were at Level 3 (35,010).
  • Of those at Level 3, the highest participation was from the 31-40 age group (10,550) followed by the 19-23 age group (8,850).
  • Level 4 or above participation was 7,660.

Further information can be found in the following featured tables : 

Education and training provider breakdowns
Education and training provider aims enrolments
Education and training subject aims enrolments by detailed level
Advanced learner loans applications by age

A new geography file has been produced containing parliamentary constituency breakdowns based on the new 2024 boundaries. This can be accessed in the following featured table: 

 Education and training participation by new parliamentary constituencies

 

Level 3 Free Courses for Jobs

As part of the Plan for Jobs (opens in a new tab), eligible adults can access free level 3 qualifications through the Free Courses for Jobs (opens in a new tab) offer.

A level 3 qualification (opens in a new tab) is equivalent to an advanced technical certificate or diploma, or A levels.

Starting in  April 2021, adults aged 19 or over who did not already have a level 3 qualification could use the offer to access a course from the list of qualifications approved for funding (opens in a new tab).

At the beginning of the offer, there were 387 qualifications approved for funding and the number of eligible qualifications has fluctuated over time as some have been added and removed from the list. Previously, learners aged 24 or over would have had to pay the course fee for these qualifications, normally through an Advanced Learner Loan.

From April 2022, the offer was extended to adults in England who were earning under the National Living Wage annually (£20,319 from April 2023) or were unemployed, regardless of whether they had a full level 3 or higher qualification.

Figures reported up to the end of the 2023/24 academic year show that;

  • The cumulative number of enrolments on the offer, reported between April 2021 and July 2024, stands at 83,230; with 34,020 of these reported in the 2023/24 academic year. This includes those taking up free courses for jobs under the extended offer from April 2022.
  • The number of enrolments based on the eligibility criteria before it was extended (i.e. excluding those already holding full level 3 qualifications) stands at 69,200.
  • Free courses for jobs enrolments are 77% higher than on equivalent courses in 2018/19, for adults who would have been able to access the offer before eligibility was extended. This is comparing enrolments in each year of the offer, under the original eligibility criteria and the qualifications valid within that year, with enrolments in the same or very similar courses that were also operational in the 2018/19 academic year.
  • Level 3 qualifications can take longer than a year to be completed and for learners to receive achievement status - especially if, for example, learners are balancing study with employment. We calculate that there have been 50,070 achievements by learners enrolled and funded through Free Courses for Jobs since April 2021.

In addition, Mayoral Combined Authorities (MCAs) and the Greater London Authority (GLA) have had the flexibility to use up to 20 per cent of Free Courses for Jobs funding to deliver selected qualifications in the sector subject areas covered by the offer but not included in the national list. In April 2023 this flexibility increased to 50 per cent for any Level 3 provision. There have been 8,460 starts on such courses between April 2022 and July 2024.

Note: The eligibility for free courses for jobs has been revised again for the 2024/25 academic year. From August 2024, adults (aged 19+) earning below £25,000 or unemployed will be eligible. We will report enrolments for the first quarter of the 2024/25 academic year in January 2025.  
 

Additional data : Free courses for jobs - cumulative enrolments and achievements by subject and sex

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Full year Community Learning data

The figures in this section cover community learning and relate to full-year final data up to and including the 2023/24 academic year, first published in November 2024.

Tailored Learning will replace Community Learning from 2024/25 and will be reported in our 2024/25 releases in place of Community Learning.  Data will be presented separately within a new accordion that will also incorporate other non-regulated provision.    

Participation

Community Learning participation decreased by 1.6% to 323,520 in 2023/24 but remains around a third higher than 2020/21 when participation was its lowest during Covid. Prior to this, there was a period of continual decline in learner numbers from 2012/13 where the number participating was 684,700.
 


Demographics

Of those learners participating in community learning in 2023/24:

  • Just under three-quarters (73.9%) were females. The ratio of female to male learners has remained broadly consistent over recent years.
  • 22.6% declared themselves as having a learning difficulty or disability (LLDD) – the highest percentage in recent years and up from 21.2% in 2022/23. LLDD learners were at their lowest share in 2020/21 during Covid.
  • Ethnic minority (excluding white minority) learners made up just under a third (32.3%) of all community learning. The share has increased year-on-year and is up from 29.4% in 2022/23. All major ethnic minority groups increased participation between 2022/23 and 2023/24.
  • Just under three-quarters (73.8%) were aged 35 and over, with these learners being quite evenly split between the 35-44, 45-59 and 60+ age groups. The share of learners aged 60+ was lower in 2020/21 as this age group showed the greatest reduction in participation during this Covid affected year.  

Community Learning Purpose

From 1 August 2023, changes were introduced to how Community learning is recorded. Seven new purpose types replaced the four Community learning types that were previously reported.

In 2023/24, Improving essential skills, Health and well-being, and Engaging and/or building confidence were the purposes with the greatest number of learners, each having over 20% of all community learners participating.     

Family Learning

Of the 323,520 learners participating in community learning in 2023/24, 38,020 (11.8%) were reported as being in family learning.

Note: The collection of family learning in the ILR for 2023/24 was not enforced through validation but providers were expected to return this data where available from the 1st of August to identify this type of delivery. 

Further information can be found in the following featured tables : 

Community learning comparisons by region
Community learning age by purpose type
Community learning ethnicity by purpose type
Community learning LLDD Primary by purpose type
Community learning participation by learner characteristics 
Community learning provider breakdowns and purpose type

A new geography file has been produced containing parliamentary constituency breakdowns based on the new 2024 boundaries. This can be accessed in the following featured tables:

Community learning participation by new parliamentary constituencies

 

Featured tables with historical Community Learning types (up to 2022/23) :

Community learning participation and achievements by primary learning difficulty/disability
Community learning participation and achievements by sex and age
Community learning provider breakdowns
Community learning by ethnicity

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Latest in year Further Education and Skills data

The cycle of updates for this section now aligns with full academic year data which can be found in the Full year Further Education and Skills data section. 

Latest headline statistics will resume in this section when we publish quarter one for 2024/25.

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Latest in year Education and Training data

The cycle of updates for this section now aligns with full academic year data which can be found in the Full year Further Education and Skills data section. 

Latest headline statistics will resume in this section when we publish quarter one for 2024/25.

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Latest in year Community Learning data

The cycle of updates for this section now aligns with full academic year data which can be found in the Full year Further Education and Skills data section. 

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National achievement rate tables

The following statistics are classified as official statistics and have been produced in line with the Code of Practice for Statistics, rather than being classed as accredited official statistics and independently reviewed as such by the Office for Statistics Regulation (opens in a new tab). The statistics are included for transparency purposes. 

Data in this section refers to 2022/23 and was first published in March 2024. Data for 2023/24 is planned to be released in March 2025.

The National Achievement Rate Tables (NARTs) present detailed tables of provider level Qualification Achievement Rates (QARs) that we use for performance management and informed choice purposes. Additionally we provide some national summary tables to show overall performance in the sector with a three year time series to enable comparison of change in performance over time. Whilst NARTs provide data on 19+ provision for performance management purposes, 16-18 provision is also included to give a complete view of individual provider performance.

In March 2020, the Secretary of State announced that the summer 2020 exam series in England would be cancelled to help fight the spread of Coronavirus (COVID-19). This announcement also stated that Government will not publish any school, college or provider-level educational performance data based on tests, assessments or exams for the 2019/20 academic year. 

In February 2021, given the continued disruption, it was confirmed this would also be the case for the 2020/21 academic year.  As a consequence of the disruption to the assessment process, the government announced a change to its school and college accountability approach (opens in a new tab), stating providers will not be held to account on the basis of exams and assessment data from summer 2020. This release will therefore only contain provider level data for 2021/22 and 2022/23.

Headline figures at a national level are available to provide a three-year time series, showing data from 2020/21 to 2022/23. That historical data has not been re-calculated and is shown as originally published in March 2023. 

Data for years prior to 2019/20 can be found in the Statistics: national achievement rates tables (opens in a new tab) collection.

Apprenticeship achievement rate statistics are available in the Apprenticeships statistics publication.
 

Headline facts and figures

Overall achievement rates within the 19+ Education and Training cohort have increased from 86.2% in 2021/22 to 86.8% in 2022/23, an increase of 0.6 percentage points. Compared with 2020/21 they are up by 1.3 percentage points. 
 

Things you need to know about this release

Care should be taken when comparing outcomes with previous years. 

The purpose of releasing national level achievement rate data for 2019/20 and 2020/21 is to maintain the continuity of information and to provide context alongside the achievement volumes found elsewhere in this publication. It is important to maintain transparency by presenting the national level data for this cohort of learners whilst recognising the extraordinary circumstances surrounding 2019/20 and 2020/21 achievement rates, as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Care should be taken when comparing with previous years due to the effects of the pandemic such as disruption to exams and assessments. 

Significant change in the way some assessments happened in 2019/20, and to a lesser extent in 2020/21, compared to previous years. Additionally, a significant change in some qualifications with the size of the cohort participating. As a result, care should be taken when comparing data with previous years. 
 


19+ Education and Training achievement rates by sector subject area

Different sectors have been affected in different ways and as a result, care should be taken when comparing data with previous years.

The largest sector is Preparation for Life and Work (710,600) making up 49.0% of the total. 88.1% of this activity is below level two.

The sector with the highest achievement rate in 2022/23 is Engineering and Manufacturing Technologies with 92.0%.

The sector showing the highest increase in achievement rate since last year is Leisure, Travel and Tourism with an increase of 8.9 percentage points from 78.9% in 2021/22 to 87.8% in 2022/23. 

The sector with the largest decrease is History, Philosophy and Theology, decreasing by 1.7 percentage points from 87.7% in 2021/22 to 86.0% in 2022/23. 

Use our table tool to explore this data further by level and qualification type, by pressing the green “Explore Data” button.


19+ Achievement Rates by  ethnicity

The figures in this section cover the achievement rates for those learners who are from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities). Please note the figures for “White ethnic groups” includes white minorities. 

In 2022/23, learners aged 19+ from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) had an overall education and training achievement rate of 86.6%, an increase of 0.7 percentage points from 85.9% in 2021/22.

The number of learners from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) was 614,600 which represents 42.4% of all learners. The take up of education and training for learners from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) varies according to the sector subject area.

The sector with the highest proportion of learners from minority ethnic groups (excluding white minorities) was Preparation for Life and Work where 54.7% of learners were from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities). The sector with the lowest proportion was Agriculture, Horticulture and Animal Care at 13.5%. 

Caution should be used interpreting simple averages because differences in provision mix across sectors will lead to change in overall averages. Press the green ‘Explore data’ button above to look at the data by age, level, sector subject area, qualification type.

Achievement rates by provider

Data for individual providers can be found here :  19+ Education and training achievement rates by Provider

Background information 

National achievement rate tables are based on underlying Qualification Achievement Rates (QAR) data. Information about the process surrounding QARs can be found here: 

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/introduction-to-qualification-achievement-rates-qars (opens in a new tab)

How rates are calculated 

Information about how QARs are calculated can be found here: 

https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/qualification-achievement-rates-2022-to-2023 (opens in a new tab)

 

Redactions

We have redacted no providers for 2022/23 and three providers from 2021/22 from our formal performance tables (NARTs) where we are unable to form a reliable QAR. This is done where the data we hold does not allow us to calculate a reliable estimate and therefore provides an unfair measure of performance. We publish headline information for these providers separately for transparency, but they do not constitute a formal QAR and should not be used to compare performance. The underpinning data is included in our national achievement rates to provide a complete view of performance. 

Details can be found in the ‘Education and Training Achievement Rates – Transparency Redactions.pdf’ supporting file in the Additional supporting files accordion.

 

Further information can be found in the following featured tables : 

19+ Education and training achievement rates by Demographics
19+ Education and training achievement rates by Ethnicity
19+ Education and training achievement rates by Learners with a Learning Difficulty and or Disability
19+ Education and training achievement rates by Sex
19+ Education and training achievement rates for essential skills
19+ Education and training achievement rates for essential skills by provider

To view achievement rates by provider, with provider type, please see the supporting 'Education and Training Achievement Rates - By Provider with Provider Type’ file in the Additional supporting files accordion.

 

 

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You are welcome to contact us directly with any comments about how we meet these standards. Alternatively, you can contact OSR by emailing regulation@statistics.gov.uk or via the OSR website.

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