Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what recent assessment she has made of the effectiveness of BTEC qualifications in widening professional and educational opportunities available to disadvantaged students.

As part of the post-16 qualifications review, the department has considered the available evidence about outcomes for students who have taken BTECs and other Applied General qualifications (AGQs), which many students from disadvantaged backgrounds take.

The evidence suggests that after taking into account a student’s background characteristics and prior attainment, those who followed an A level-only route generally experience better outcomes in terms of attainment and future employment impacts. Considering access to higher education (HE) and reformed AGQs, the department found that across different prior attainment bandings, students with A levels were consistently more likely to enter HE than those just holding AGQs. For those with the lowest prior attainment, mixed A level and AGQ programmes were slightly more likely to lead to HE than those with a study programme consisting only of A levels.

The department will continue to fund some alternative level 3 qualifications including BTECs where they do not overlap with A levels or T Levels, and where they meet the new quality criteria being implemented as part of the funding approval process for 2025 and beyond. Details of this will be published in due course. Qualifications such as BTECs will continue to play an important role for 16-to-19-year-olds and adults. This includes students taking these qualifications in mixed programmes alongside A levels, or as an alternative programme in areas that may be less well-served by A levels or T Levels.

The updated impact assessment published alongside the response to the second-stage consultation looked at the potential impact of the review on students, including those from disadvantaged backgrounds. This is available at: https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/review-of-post-16-qualifications-at-level-3-in-england.