Minor amendment made to text in third bullet of Headline Facts and Figures summary section.
National and provider-level information about the outcomes for final year teacher trainees in England in the academic year 2020/21. Outcome measures presented are the proportion of final year trainees that gained qualified teacher status, and the employment rates of these qualified teachers. The publication also includes information on the number of assessment only candidates and the outcomes for early years ITT trainees.
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These provider level tables contain the qualified teacher status and employment outcomes of postgraduate and undergraduate final year ITT trainees and their characteristics by provider. The data in this table covers data for 2017/18 to 2020/21 for qualified teacher status and 2017/18 to 2019/20 for employment outcomes.
The initial teacher training (ITT) performance profiles are designed to:
These statistics are based on final year trainees (see methodology for more detail on how final year trainees are identified). For comprehensive statistics about new entrants to ITT and their characteristics, please refer to the ITT census publications, available on the ITT statistics webpage.
These statistics cover those training to teach via both postgraduate and undergraduate routes, as well as separate sections on those undertaking early years initial teacher training (EYITT) and assessment only (AO).
The following tables are included. All contain data on QTS award rates and employment rates:
In this year’s publication, the main tables contain four years of data, from 2017/18 to 2020/21. Please see the methodology for more details on how provisional and revised employment rates are calculated.
To become a qualified teacher in England, trainees typically complete a programme of initial teacher training (ITT). This provides them with training, mentoring and teaching practice in schools, and leads to the award of qualified teacher status (QTS) for successful trainees.
There are several pathways into teaching which include an undergraduate route, over a three or four-year course, and postgraduate routes which normally run for one year full-time. Postgraduate fee-funded courses can be undertaken through a higher education institution (HEI), or via a group of schools delivering a school-centred initial teacher training (SCITT) programme or a School Direct fee-funded programme. Postgraduate salaried routes include the School Direct salaried programme, the High Potential ITT programme and, since the 2018/19 academic year, the Postgraduate Teaching Apprenticeship (PGTA)[1][2]. Two non-mainstream routes, early years ITT (EYITT) and assessment only (AO), are covered in separate sections below.
At HEIs, the university or college delivers the pedagogy of teaching supplemented by placements in schools. Successful trainees are awarded QTS and a postgraduate certificate in education (PGCE). On school-led routes, trainees are placed in a school from the first day of training. Most school-led routes also include a PGCE as many school-led providers will pair with an HEI.
Footnotes
[1] The postgraduate teaching apprenticeship (PGTA) was a new route introduced in 2018/19. It is a growing route, although relatively small (675 trainees in 2020/21) compared to other routes.
[2] High Potential ITT trainees were formerly reported as Teach First trainees.
Footnotes
[1] Due to the disruption to training caused by Covid-19, a small proportion of 2019/20 & 2020/21 trainees were offered course extensions into the following academic year to enable them to gain adequate evidence of meeting the Teachers’ Standards.
[2] Provisional figures are estimated as it is too early in the reporting cycle to capture everyone who is employed in a state school. Revised figures will be calculated following collection of the November 2021 school workforce data and will be published as part of the 2020/21 performance profiles publication; see the methodology section for further details.
[3] Revised figures for 2019/20 are calculated from more complete data using the November 2021 school workforce census; see the methodology section for further details.
[4] Trainees who were not awarded QTS includes those who left the course before the end (excluding those who left the course within 90 days of the start) and trainees who did not meet the standards.
[5] The postgraduate teaching apprenticeship (PGTA) was a new route introduced in 2018/19. It is a growing route, although relatively small (675 trainees in 2020/21) compared to other routes.
[6] Undergraduate trainees who were affected by Covid-19 were also offered course extensions into the following academic year to enable them to gain adequate evidence of meeting the Teachers’ Standards. As with postgraduate trainees, their outcomes will be recorded in a future ITT performance profiles publication once they have completed their course.
[7] Undergraduate courses have historically had a higher rate of trainees not awarded QTS than yet to complete their course. This is due to undergraduate trainees being excluded from the publication if they don’t have a recorded course end date (see methodology for more details). The exclusion of these trainees means those offered course extensions will not be included here and the increase in proportion of yet to complete trainees seen in postgraduate figures is less for undergraduates.
Footnotes
[1] Due to the disruption to training caused by Covid-19, a small proportion of 2019/20 & 2020/21 trainees were offered course extensions into the following academic year to enable them to gain adequate evidence of meeting the Teachers’ Standards.
[2] Some trainees in their expected final year of ITT may not have fully completed their course at the end of the academic year. Trainees who are yet to complete the course will either go on to be awarded QTS, leave the course before the end or complete without being awarded QTS in a later academic year.
[3] Trainees who were not awarded QTS includes those who left the course before the end (excluding those who left the course within 90 days of the start) and trainees who did not meet the standards.
[4] Provisional figures are estimated as it is too early in the reporting cycle to capture everyone who is employed in a state school. Revised figures will be calculated following collection of the November 2022 school workforce data and will be published as part of the 2021/22 performance profiles publication; see the methodology section for further details.
[5] Note that the 2019/20 & 2020/21 cohorts will have been seeking employment during the Covid-19 pandemic.
Footnotes
[1] The postgraduate teaching apprenticeship (PGTA) was a new route introduced in 2018/19. It is a growing route, although relatively small (675 trainees in 2020/21) compared to other routes.
[2] High Potential ITT trainees were formerly reported as Teach First trainees.
[3] Provisional figures are estimated as it is too early in the reporting cycle to capture everyone who is employed in a state school. Revised figures will be calculated following collection of the November 2022 school workforce data and will be published as part of the 2021/22 performance profiles publication; see the methodology section for further details.
Footnotes
[1] In 2020/21, 419 out of 35,371 (1%) final year postgraduate trainees had an unknown disability status compared with 2% of final year postgraduate trainees in 2019/20.
[2] Due to the disruption to training caused by Covid-19, a small proportion of 2019/20 & 2020/21 trainees were offered course extensions into the following academic year to enable them to gain adequate evidence of meeting the Teachers’ Standards.
[3] Some trainees in their expected final year of ITT may not have fully completed their course at the end of the academic year. Trainees who are yet to complete the course will either go on to be awarded QTS, leave the course before the end or complete without being awarded QTS in a later academic year.
[4] In 2020/21, 1,755 out of 35,371 (5%) postgraduate trainees had an unknown ethnicity status compared with 6% of final year postgraduate trainees in 2019/20.
[5] Other ethnic group includes trainees with ethnic background recorded as Arab.
[6] Trainees who were not awarded QTS includes those who left the course before the end (excluding those who left the course within 90 days of the start) and trainees who did not meet the standards.
[7] Provisional figures are estimated as it is too early in the reporting cycle to capture everyone who is employed in a state school. Revised figures will be calculated following collection of the November 2022 school workforce data and will be published as part of the 2021/22 performance profiles publication; see the methodology section for further details.
| Percentage awarded QTS | Percentage of those awarded QTS teaching in a state school | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Age | Under 25 | 90 | 72 |
| 25 and Over | 86 | 73 | |
| Disability | Declared | 81 | 68 |
| None declared | 88 | 73 | |
| Ethnic group | Asian | 81 | 64 |
| Black | 78 | 65 | |
| Mixed ethnicity | 86 | 72 | |
| Other | 82 | 66 | |
| White | 89 | 74 | |
| Gender | Male | 84 | 71 |
| Female | 89 | 73 |
Footnotes
Footnotes
[1] Due to the disruption to training caused by Covid-19, a small proportion of 2019/20 & 2020/21 trainees were offered course extensions into the following academic year to enable them to gain adequate evidence of meeting the Teachers’ Standards.
[2] Some trainees in their expected final year of ITT may not have fully completed their course at the end of the academic year. Trainees who are yet to complete the course will either go on to be awarded QTS, leave the course before the end or complete without being awarded QTS in a later academic year.
[3] In 2020/21, 1130 out of 35,371 (3%) final year postgraduate trainees had an unknown prior degree class compared to 6% of final year postgraduate trainees in 2019/20.
[4] Other degree class includes third class honours degrees, and ‘ordinary’ or ‘general’ degrees awarded after a non-honours course, and degrees awarded after a non-honours course that was not available to be classified. It also includes other categories from non-UK degrees.
[5] ’Upper second’ includes undivided second class. In 2020/21, 29 final year postgraduate trainees had an undivided second class degree.
Footnotes
[1] Region is determined by the location of the provider, which is not necessarily where the trainee is located.
[2] Due to the disruption to training caused by Covid-19, a small proportion of 2019/20 & 2020/21 trainees were offered course extensions into the following academic year to enable them to gain adequate evidence of meeting the Teachers’ Standards. Regional trends have been impacted by an increase in the proportion of trainees yet to complete which has had a larger impact on certain routes/providers.
[3] Some trainees in their expected final year of ITT may not have fully completed their course at the end of the academic year. Trainees who are yet to complete the course will either go on to be awarded QTS, leave the course before the end or complete without being awarded QTS in a later academic year.
[4] Provisional figures are estimated as it is too early in the reporting cycle to capture everyone who is employed in a state school. Revised figures will be calculated following collection of the November 2022 school workforce data and will be published as part of the 2021/22 performance profiles publication; see the methodology section for further details.
[5] Revised figures for 2019/20 are calculated from more complete data using the November 2021 school workforce census; see the methodology section for further details.
Gaining QTS through AO is a way for existing unqualified teachers, support staff or teaching assistants to demonstrate that they already meet all the QTS standards, without the need for any further training. AO is open to those with relevant teaching experience who hold a degree, or for those with a teaching qualification from another country. Candidates undertaking AO do not complete a course to achieve QTS, but are instead assessed against the Teacher’s Standards. The entry criteria for AO is the same as those for all initial teacher training (ITT) courses and must be met in full prior to registration. Only DfE-approved accredited providers of ITT can assess and recommend AO candidates for QTS.
Typical candidates for AO might include:
Footnotes
[1] Some qualified teachers from overseas can obtain professional recognition and the award of QTS without undertaking ITT or AO. This applies to fully qualified teachers who trained in the European Economic Area (EEA), under the terms of Council Directive 2005/36/EC. Teachers who trained outside the EEA must have their qualifications recognised by an EEA member state and must have 3 years of experience in that state to be eligible to apply for QTS in England without undertaking ITT or AO. Teachers from Australia, Canada, New Zealand and United States can also apply for mutual recognition and must be fully qualified and eligible to teach permanently in the country in question. This must be documented from the recognised authority in that state. There is further information on the award of QTS on our webpage.
[2] Revised figure for 2020/21 taken from ITT Census 2021/22.
[3] Excludes those with unknown degree class, 2020/21 revised figures taken from the ITT census 2021/22.
Footnotes
[1] Providers graded by the Office for Standards in Education, Children’s Services and Skills (Ofsted) as ‘requires improvement’, or below, cannot provide EYITT.
[2] 'Maintained’ refers to schools or nurseries where funding and oversight is provided through the local authority.
[3] Trainees with EYTS can work as level 3 support workers in a maintained nursery or school. They can work as unqualified teachers in some maintained schools or academies dependent on the school.
[4] Trainees can also undertake an assessment only route to earn EYTS. This is designed for graduates with experience of working with children from birth to five, who are able to demonstrate the Teachers' Standards (early years) without further training; for example, early years teachers who trained overseas. The EYITT assessment only route is included in the Assessment Only section from 2020/21.
The initial teacher training performance profiles are collected each year for trainees in the final year of their ITT training. This year, the DfE has again collected data on the Database of Trainee Teachers and Providers (DTTP) and its successor Register. The main collection period occurred from September to November 2021 but in some cases further changes were made directly by the DTTP team in agreement with providers.
The definition of final year trainees, as well as all other definitions in terms of data collected, remains the same as in ITT performance profiles for academic year 2017/18 (see below), so all comparisons remain valid over time.
For the academic year 2020/21, we received data from all 239 providers. This consisted of 169 SCITTs, and 70 HEIs. All data were reviewed, confirmed and signed-off by a designated person at each provider.
This statistical release presents final year trainee outcomes and provisional employment data for 2020/21 and revised employment data for 2019/20.
Data for the ITT performance profiles were completed, reviewed and signed-off by providers. The data collection and publication team within DfE carried out additional quality checks and data validations throughout the data entry process. After data was extracted on 22nd March 2022 (excluding employment data which was extracted at a later date), a quality assurance process was undertaken by the publication production team. This process included detailed quality checks across the dataset.
This quality assurance process identified a small number of issues. These, along with the solutions that have been implemented, are outlined below.
The Department uses internal administrative data sources to estimate how many final year trainees awarded QTS go on to employment in a state-funded school in England. For full details on the methodology for measuring employment, see the publication methodology.
For this publication, we calculate two employment rates:
Provisional employment rate: Departmental analysis has found that matching ITT trainee data to School Workforce Census (SWC) data from the year following qualification does not fully capture how many trainees go onto employment because some teachers do not start in time to be recorded in that SWC, while others start up to a year later. We account for these teachers by applying an uplift to the 2020/21 employment figures to estimate a provisional employment rate for 2020/21. The uplift is derived by comparing with data from previous years to determine what proportion of new teachers employed during the year were not included in their first school workforce census but were captured in the following year’s census (the uplift applied for 2020/21 was around 30.6% of those not captured in the first year).
The initial teacher training performance profiles are collected each year for trainees in the final year of their ITT training. This year, the DfE has again collected data on the Database of Trainee Teachers and Providers (DTTP). The main collection period occurred from September to November 2020 but in some cases further changes were made directly by the DTTP team in agreement with providers. High level summary tables of trainee numbers for each ITT provider were shared with the relevant provider in January 2021, for checking ahead of data cleaning. The figures shared at this time may differ from those in the final publication due to further data cleaning being carried out after the data had been signed off.
The definition of final year trainees, as well as all other definitions in terms of data collected, remains the same as in ITT performance profiles for academic year 2017/18 (see below), so all comparisons remain valid over time.
For the academic year 2019/20, we received data from all 238 providers. This consisted of 170 SCITTs, and 68 HEIs. All data were reviewed, confirmed and signed-off by a designated person at each provider.
This statistical release presents final year trainee outcomes and provisional employment data for 2020/21 and revised employment data for 2019/20.
After data was extracted on 4th May 2021 (excluding employment data which was extracted at a later date), a quality assurance process was undertaken by the publication production team. This process included detailed quality checks across the dataset.
This quality assurance process identified a small number of issues. These, along with the solutions that have been implemented, are outlined below.
The Department uses internal administrative data sources to estimate how many final year trainees awarded QTS go on to employment in a state-funded school in England. For full details on the methodology for measuring employment, see the publication methodology.
For this publication, we calculate two employment rates:
Provisional employment rate: Departmental analysis has found that matching ITT trainee data to school workforce census data from the year following qualification does not fully capture how many trainees go onto employment because some teachers do not start in time to be recorded in that SWC, while others start up to a year later. We account for these teachers by applying an uplift to the 2019/20 employment figures to estimate a provisional employment rate for 2019/20. The uplift is derived by comparing with data from previous years to determine what proportion of new teachers employed during the year were not included in their first school workforce census but were captured in the following year’s census (the uplift applied for 2019/20 was around 27% of those not captured in the first year).
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