Background to publication
Year-on-year comparisons of SWC teacher pay data do not directly reflect annual pay awards for a number of reasons. While the annual uplifts to pay ranges in the School Teachers Pay and Conditions Document (STPCD) for the present academic year are proposed and agreed at a national level, it is for schools to determine pay for teachers on an individual level, with these decisions incorporating schools’ pay flexibilities to deviate from the national framework, as well as teachers’ performance reviews. Such individual decisions may not have been made for all teachers by the point at which the census occurs in the Autumn. Therefore, while some schools report data reflecting the latest pay review in the School Workforce Census, some report that of the previous academic year (without the outcome of the latest pay review applied).
This has been more noticeable in the past two years as there was more variability in the annual pay awards and the conclusion of the consultation process and publication of the STPCD was later in the year (for a detailed explanation see the school workforce methodology and the methodology section for this ad hoc release).
To address this issue, this ad hoc publication on pay statistics uses TPS data to provide an alternative estimate of the median teacher salary, that is representative of pay fully inclusive of the latest award. TPS data is administrative data collected in the process of managing the contributions of teachers and their employers to their pensions. Unlike the SWC, which provides a snapshot of data on the census date, the TPS data is retrospectively updated with any pay decisions that were backdated to before the census date in November each year.
Following a pause in pay awards for most public sector workers in 2021, teachers received a pay award of 5.4% on average in 2022 (this was 5% for most teachers but higher for starting salaries) and 6.5% in 2023. Taking the past two years together, the average pay award for teachers was 12.3% (and 11.8% for experienced teachers).
SWC data shows an increase in median salaries of 6.1% over these two years, which is lower than the pay award.
| Census Year | Median teacher salary using SWC data | YoY % change | For reference: pay point U3, rest of England | For reference: pay award for the upper pay range |
| 2021/22 | £41,290 | £41,604 | ||
| 2022/23 | £41,604 | 0.8% | £43,685 | 5.0% |
| 2023/24 | £43,801 | 5.3% | £46,525 | 6.5% |
These are official statistics in development and as part of the process of development we will be reviewing and improving our methodology and considering whether future publications are necessary. Feedback on the quality and relevance of these statistics going forwards can be sent to schoolworkforce.statistics@education.gov.uk.