Academic year 2022/23

Further education and skills

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See all updates (9) for Academic year 2022/23
  1. Updated to add links to the interactive data visualisation tool

  2. Updated with data covering August 2022 to April 2023

  3. Updated to add ability to look at achievement rates for individual learning aims with Learning Aim Reference codes

  4. Updated to add achievement rate supporting file containing provider types

  5. Updated to add additional achievement rate data showing rates for individual learning aims

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

  7. Updated with data covering the first two quarters of 2022/23. Achievement rate data also added covering 2021/22

  8. Updated to clarify wording around interactive data visualisation tool

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

Introduction

This release presents provisional in-year data on adult (19+) further education (FE) and skills in England reported for the academic year 2022/23 to date (August to April) based on data returned by providers in June 2023. This includes apprenticeships and traineeships in the overall FE and skills numbers, but for statistics relevant to apprenticeships and traineeships please see the ‘Apprenticeships and traineeships release’. 

Changes to the structure of the release

In January we changed the structure of the release to improve user access to content and to allow for easier maintenance. The same amount of data is still being published on a quarterly basis. If you wish to provide feedback on these changes please contact us at FE.OFFICIALSTATISTICS@education.gov.uk

Impact of COVID-19 on reporting of FE and apprenticeship data

Historic data in this release covers periods affected by varying COVID-19 restrictions, which will have impacted on FE provision and also provider reporting behaviour via the Individualised Learner Record. Therefore, extra care should be taken in comparing and interpreting data presented in this release.

Please note that the ‘Explore data and files’ section contains the underlying files that underpin this release and allows expert users to interrogate and analyse the data for themselves. For pre-populated summary statistics please see the relevant section underneath, from which the data can be further explored using the ‘Explore data’ functionality. You can also view featured tables or create your own table using the ‘create tables' functionality.


Headline facts and figures - 2022/23

Of the 1,612,130 adult (19+) government-funded further education and skills learners participating in 2022/23:

  • Females account for 60.5% (975,880).
  • Higher level (level 4 or above) participation increased by 8.4%, to 249,670 from 230,250 in 2021/22.
  • Learners recorded as having a Learning difficulty/disability (LLDD) account for 18.3% of the cohort (285,250) an increase of 12.6% from 253,370 in 2021/22.

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:

About these statistics

This statistical release presents provisional information on adult (19+) FE and skills participation and achievements in England for the 2022/23 academic year (covering August 2022 to April 2023).

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 and traineeships data, please see ‘Apprenticeships and traineeships release’, but note that apprenticeships and traineeships 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 tenth ILR data return from FE and apprenticeship providers for the 2022/23 academic year, which was taken in June 2023.

National achievement rate tables data

Figures in the ‘national achievement rate tables’ section are as published in March 2023. These official statistics cover achievement rates for the 2021/22 academic year and would have been previously released as part of the standalone National achievement rate tables publication. 

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.

How to find data and supplementary tables in this release

The Further education and skills publication still provides the same range of data it always did, but for this academic year we have made structural changes to improve user’s experience. 

We have also adopted a new naming convention for files to help users find their data of interest. We have not changed the content of these files except in a few cases where we have merged some smaller files. You can find a look-up of the old and new file names in the file called “New Release Layout - Names Lookup” that can be found in the Additional supporting files accordion.

This section serves to signpost users to the data most relevant to their uses by detailing the routes through which it can be accessed. 

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

'Featured tables' provide further detail with figures broken down by common areas of interest. These can be found by going to the 'Explore data and files used in this release' section and clicking 'View or create your own tables'. Featured tables are shown in ‘Select a data set or featured table’ (Step 2). These tables are created to provide the next level of detail one might wish to find below the level of detail provided by tables embedded within the release. They also provide the user the opportunity to then amend content, reorder and take away to meet their needs. Within the release we list out the most relevant featured tables at the end of each commentary section.

In addition to featured tables you can also access underlying data files and build your own tables using the 'Create your own tables' tool. For example, the featured table showing enrolments by provider is produced from an underlying data file which also contains detail on the level of an aim, and it's sector subject area.

The list of files available can be accessed in the 'Explore data and files used in this release' section and clicking 'View or create your own tables'. In ‘Select a data set or featured table’ (Step 2) the file (‘data set’) of interest can be selected.

Alternatively you can modify an existing featured table by selecting it and then depending on the breakdowns available, edit the location, time periods, indicators and/or filters (Steps 3, 4 and 5).

There is 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.

All of the data available in this release can be downloaded using the 'Download all data (zip)' button at the top right of this page. The 'Explore data and files used in this release' section also has the functionality to download all files, but also contains a data catalogue that allows individual files to be downloaded.

Feedback

We have made recent structural changes to how we publish our data and statistics. 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

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 2021/22 academic year, originally published in November 2022. 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 considerably in the last decade. 1.7 million adults participated in 2021/22 compared to nearly 3.3 million at the most recent peak in 2012/13 – a fall of nearly a half. Education and training, the largest component of FE & Skills participation, has declined at a similar rate over the same period from 1.8 million to just under 0.9 million.

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 some recovery seen in 2021/22.

In 2021/22, participation in all strands was up slightly on the previous years.

 

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 1,719,600 adult learners participating in 2021/22: 

  • The number on below Level 2 courses (excluding Basic skills) was 278,800.
  • The number on a Basic skills course was 434,100.
  • The number on Level 2 courses was 551,100 (on Full Level 2, there were 139,400 learners) and on Level 3 there were 391,900 learners (on Full Level 3, there were 322,400 learners).
  • The number on Level 4 or above courses was 245,100.

Demographics

Three-in-five learners participating in FE & Skills were female in 2021/22 (61.0%). This share has gradually increased from 58.1% in 2017/18. 

Over the same period, the proportion of learners aged 50 and above has reduced from 20.1% to 16.4%.

The proportion of learners declaring a learning difficulty or disability has remained relatively stable. 

Ethnicity

The proportion of learners participating in FE & Skills who are white has declined in recent years. 73.8% of learners were white in 2021/22 compared to 77.5% in 2017/18. Over the same period:

  • Asian learners increased from 9.4% to 10.5%
  • Black learners increased from 7.3% to 7.9%
  • Learners from mixed/multiple ethnic groups increased from 2.8% to 3.6% and 
  • Learners from other ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) increased from 2.9% to 4.2%

Additional featured tables

The following tables offer more detailed breakdowns and combinations of characteristics and are available in our table builder tool :

Further education and skills learner characteristics 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 participation and achievements per 100,000 of population by region

Basic skills in year comparisons by Region
Basic skills participation and achievements by subject

AEB - Adult education budget full year comparisons by level

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 2021/22 academic year, originally published in November 2022.

Subject and Level

Adult participation in Education and training increased by 1.0% to 878,520, compared to 2020/21 but has fallen by 22.4% since 2017/18. Achievements have increased in each of the last two academic years to 682,510 in 2021/22 but remain 24% below 2017/18 achievements.

Level 2 courses were the most popular (431,860 learners participating), followed by basic skills (270,630). 

Out of 1,691,340 education and training learning aim enrolments in 2021/22:

  • Science, technology engineering and maths (STEM) subjects represent 14.5% - an increase from 13.8% in 2020/21 and 12.0% in 2019/20.
  • Preparation for life and work was the sector subject area with the most enrolments (770,140), followed by health, public services and care (297,840).
  • Entry and Level 1 courses together make up 52.4% of enrolments – 886,990 enrolments in total. The majority of these are in preparation for life (72.3%).
  • Level 2 courses account for 34.6% overall (585,040) – just over a third of which are in health, public services and care (200,540).
  • At Level 4 or above, the largest proportion of enrolments are in health, public services and care (42.1%) followed by business, administration and law (21.4%).

Demographics

Of the 878,520 learners participating in adult education and training

  • Females account for 64.3% (564,550). The rate of female participation in 2017/18 was considerably lower at 55.7%.
  • Learners aged 19-24, 25-49, and 50 and over accounted for 20.9% (183,780), 62.9% (552,890) and 16.1% (141,850) respectively.
  • Those declaring a learner learning difficulty and/or disability (LLDD) account for 20.5% (175,060).
  • The proportion of White learners dropped to 65.3% from 68.8% in the previous year. All ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) increased their proportion of education and training participants compared to 2020/21.

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 the lowest.

Advanced Learner Loans

Of the 65,800 learners participating with an advanced learner loan in 2021/22:

  • Most of the learners were at Level 3 (57,300).
  • Of those at Level 3, the highest participation was from the 31-40 age group (17,700) followed by the 24-30 age group (15,900).
  • Level 4 or above participation was 9,000.

Additional featured tables

The following tables offer more detailed breakdowns and combinations of characteristics and are available in our table builder tool :

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 learner participation and achievement by age

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

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 2021/22 academic year, originally published in November 2022.

Provision / Type

Community learning participation increased by 24.9% to 304,400 in 2021/22, compared to the same period in 2020/21. This followed a period of continual decline since 2012/13 when the number participating was 684,700.

Demographics

Proportionally more learners from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) are participating in community learning compared to previous years.

In 2021/22:

  • Asian/Asian British backgrounds account for 12.8% of participating learners – up from 11.0% in 2018/19
  • Black learners account for 7.1% – up from 5.9%
  • Learners from mixed/multiple ethnic groups account for 3.2%– up from 2.4%
  • Other non-white learners account for 5.5% – up from 3.8%
  • White learners account for 71.3% - down from 76.9%

Additional featured tables

The following tables offer more detailed breakdowns and combinations of characteristics and are available in our table builder tool :

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

Community learning provider breakdowns

Latest in year data

The figures in this section cover adult (19+) further education and skills in the first three quarters of the 2022/23 academic year (August to April) and show corresponding data at the same time point for the previous 2 years.

Level 3 Free Courses for Jobs

As part of the government’s Plan for Jobs, eligible adults can now access free level 3 qualifications through the Free Courses for Jobs offer.

A level 3 qualification is equivalent to an advanced technical certificate or diploma, or A levels.

Since April 2021, adults aged 19 or over who do not already have a level 3 qualification can use the offer to access one from the list of qualifications approved for funding. In April 2021 there were 387 qualifications approved for funding on the offer, although this figure is subject to change over time as qualifications are added and removed from the list. In April 2023, there were 416 qualifications approved. 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 are earning under the National Living Wage annually (£20,319 from April 2023) or are unemployed, regardless of whether they have a full level 3 qualification or higher.

In addition, Mayoral Combined Authorities (MCAs) also have the flexibility to use 50% of their funding to fund learners on level 3 qualifications not included on the national list but are proven to meet local labour needs from April 2023. In the future, we aim to report on the number of qualifications that use this flexibility.

Figures reported up to first three quarters of the 2022/23 academic year show that;

  • The cumulative number of enrolments on the offer, reported between April 2021 and April 2023, stands at 45,170 (with 4,780 having started in the 2020/21 academic year, 19,700 in 2021/22 and 20,700 reported so far for the first nine months of 2022/23). 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 40,050.  
  • 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 estimate that there have been 17,290 achievements by learners enrolled and funded through Free Courses for Jobs since April 2021.

Additional featured tables

The following featured tables offer more detailed breakdowns and combinations of characteristics and are available in our create your own tables tool:

Further education and skills in year comparisons by provider type and level
Further education and skills in year comparisons by region
Further education and skills in year comparisons by sector

AEB - Adult education budget in year participation comparisons by level

Education and training participation by provider type in year comparisons

Education and training achievements by provider type in year comparisons
Education and training in year participation by English devolved area

Community learning in year comparisons by region

Community learning learner characteristics in year comparisons

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

Interactive data visualisation tool

The interactive data visualisation tool has been developed to complement the Further education and skills publication.

The tool provides a visual, interactive presentation of the data and gives users the capacity to investigate the different types of FE provision across geographical areas and providers.

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 national statistics and approved as such by the United Kingdom Statistics Authority. The statistics are included for transparency purposes. 

Data in this section refers to 2021/22 and was first published in March 2023. Data for 2022/23 is planned to be released in March 2024.

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, 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.

Headline figures at a national level are available to provide a three-year time series, showing data from 2019/20 to 2021/22. That historical data has not been re-calculated and is shown as originally published in March 2022. 

Data for years prior to 2019/20 can be found in the Statistics: national achievement rates tables collection.

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

 

Headline facts and figures

Overall achievement rates within the 19+ Education and Training cohort have increased from 85.5% in 2020/21 to 86.2% in 2021/22, an increase of 0.7 percentage points. Compared with 2019/20 they are up by 0.2 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 (674,040) making up 47.2% of the total. 86.8% of this activity is below level two.

The sector with the highest achievement rate in 2021/22 is Arts, Media and Publishing with 91.1%.

The sector showing the highest increase in achievement rate since last year is Leisure, Travel and Tourism with an increase of 15 percentage points from 63.9% in 2020/21 to 78.9% in 2021/22. 

The sector with the largest decrease is Science and Mathematics, decreasing by 7 percentage points from 86.4% in 2020/21 to 79.4% in 2021/22. 

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 Learner Characteristics

 

Overall 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 2021/22, learners aged 19+ from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) had an overall education and training achievement rate of 85.9%, an increase of 1.1 percentage points from 84.8% in 2020/21.

The number of learners from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities) was 587,000 which represents 41.2% 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 54.9% of learners were from ethnic minorities (excluding white minorities). The sector with the lowest proportion was Agriculture, Horticulture and Animal Care at 10.1%. 

 

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.

 

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: 

Introduction to Qualification Achievement Rates (QARs) 

How rates are calculated 

Information about how QARs are calculated can be found here: 

Qualification achievement rates 2021 to 2022

 

Redactions

We have redacted three providers 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.

 

Additional featured tables

The following featured tables offer more detailed breakdowns and combinations of characteristics and are available in our create your own tables tool:

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 Provider

19+ Education and training achievement rates by Sex

 

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.

 

UPDATED APRIL 2023 - We have amended the Learning Aim Title column to now include the Learning Aim Reference. This is to allow differentiation between those learning aims which have identical names. This is available within the Create your own tables tool, in the “Achievement Rates - Subject by Age, SSA T1, Qualification type, Level, Learning aim title” option.

We have also made this available as a downloadable CSV file with the learning aim reference available as a separate column in the Additional supporting files accordion.

 

Help and support

Methodology

Find out how and why we collect, process and publish these statistics.

National statistics

The United Kingdom Statistics Authority designated these statistics as National Statistics in accordance with the Statistics and Registration Service Act 2007 and signifying compliance with the Code of Practice for Statistics.

Designation signifying their compliance with the authority's Code of Practice for Statistics which broadly means these statistics are:

  • managed impartially and objectively in the public interest
  • meet identified user needs
  • produced according to sound methods
  • well explained and readily accessible

Once designated as National Statistics it's a statutory requirement for statistics to follow and comply with the Code of Practice for Statistics to be observed.

Find out more about the standards we follow to produce these statistics through our Standards for official statistics published by DfE guidance.

Contact us

If you have a specific enquiry about Further education and skills statistics and data:

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