Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what assessment her Department has made of the potential impact of its Initial Teacher Training Market Review on recruiting more teachers from diverse backgrounds.

In the 2019 Teacher Recruitment and Retention Strategy, the Department committed to reviewing the Initial Teacher Training (ITT) market, with the aim to make it work more effectively. Following a public consultation in 2021, the Department extended the timeline of implementing the ITT Market Review recommendations by one year, from 2023 to 2024. This allowed more time for existing and prospective ITT providers to make the necessary preparations and ensure stability in ITT recruitment and the supply of teachers. It is now important to bring in the reforms to ensure future trainees benefit from these changes.

Quality of teaching is the single most important in-school factor for improving outcomes for children. Reforms to the ITT market will help all trainees across the country receive quality ITT provision and further support at every stage of their teaching career. The reforms are a significant step in the delivery of the Department’s ambitious programme to create a world-class teacher development system.

The Department remains committed to supporting the supply of high quality teacher training in all areas of the country. 179 providers have been accredited to deliver ITT from September 2024, following a rigorous accreditation process designed to drive up the quality and consistency of ITT leading to Qualified Teacher Status. These providers cover all regions of the country and include new entrants to the market. The Department will continue to monitor the market and review its implementation measures to ensure that there is sufficient provision of consistently high performing ITT provision driven by demand.

The Department has funded recruitment and retention programmes to attract applications to ITT and continually monitors provision levels to ensure that there are enough ITT places to meet teacher recruitment targets. This involves working with a wide range of stakeholders to ensure there are sufficient ITT places across the country from the 2024/25 academic year.

ITT recruitment targets are calculated using analysis from the Teacher Workforce Model (TWM). The TWM uses different sources to calculate these targets, including data regarding the composition of the teacher workforce and curriculum taught in secondary schools, returner and leaver rates, historic recruitment performance, economic data and forecasts, and the latest data and assumptions on future recruitment and retention of teachers. The TWM considers the cumulative effect of these factors when calculating ITT recruitment targets.

The Department has made £181 million available in bursaries and scholarships to attract trainee teachers in high priority subjects for the 2023/24 academic year, a £52 million increase on the current academic year. As graduates in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) subjects attract the highest salaries outside teaching, the Department is offering a £27,000 tax-free bursary and a £29,000 tax-free scholarship in chemistry, computing, mathematics, and physics. In addition, a Levelling Up Premium worth up to £3,000 tax-free annually is available for mathematics, physics, chemistry and computing teachers who choose to work in disadvantaged schools early in their career. This reflects the priority the Department places on training teachers to teach STEM subjects and will support recruitment and retention of specialist teachers in the subjects, schools and areas, that need them most. The new Apply for Teacher Training service, rolled out in October 2021, will allow the Department to collect more data, providing greater insight into candidate behaviour and the behaviour of providers of teacher training. This is so the Department can identify barriers and work to address them. The Department will continue to work closely with ITT providers to explore, design and test new interventions to ensure teaching is an inclusive career that is open to candidates from all backgrounds.

My right hon. Friend, the Prime Minister, has set out a new mission to ensure all pupils study mathematics to 18 and leave school better equipped for the jobs of the future. Further details will be set out in due course. The Department is looking closely at the effects on the school and further education workforce and we are clear that the reformed ITT market will provide the high quality training needed for teachers to meet the Prime Minister’s ambition.