The Department for Education has raised the cash incentives for teacher trainees next year amid mounting concerns about the recruitment crisis.
The government has announced increased bursaries across several subjects and has also reinstated the English bursary at £15,000 after this was removed two years ago.
But school sector leaders have warned that although increased bursaries are welcome, they “only scratch the surface” in dealing with the ongoing teacher recruitment crisis.
Today’s DfE announcement comes after recent government figures revealed that the department had missed its own target for secondary teacher trainee numbers by 40 per cent.
According to that data, the subjects facing the biggest shortfalls in teacher trainees for this September were computing (55 per cent below target), physics (40 per cent below), English (19 per cent below) and biology (19 per cent below).
It is hoped that the boost to bursaries, which is worth £181 million, will be a welcome incentive for potential teacher trainees.
Teacher training bursary changes for 2023-24
The DfE has announced the following changes to support for people training to be teachers:
- For the 2023-24 cohort, mathematics, physics, chemistry and computing bursaries will increase from £24,000 to £27,000.
- Bursaries for languages and ancient languages will increase from £15,000 to £25,000.
- The geography bursary will increase from £15,000 to £25,000.
- The biology bursary will rise from £10,000 to £20,000.
- The design and technology bursary will rise to £20,000, up from £15,000.
- A bursary of £15,000 has been brought back for English.
There have been no announced changes to bursaries for art and design, business studies, history, music and religious education, which are currently given no funding.
Bursary and scholarship eligibility will also be extended to all non-UK national trainees in physics and languages, two subjects that have seen major teacher shortages.
Jack Worth, schools workforce lead at the National Foundation for Educational Research (NFER), said that the bursary increases were “likely to give those subjects a much-needed recruitment boost, after a year of poor recruitment numbers”.
He said the NFER was “pleased to see English and biology get big increases, given the difficulties NFER’s analysis has highlighted in recruiting enough English and science teachers in 2022”.
But he warned: “Some subjects have not had a bursary increase despite our analysis suggesting they are likely to be below target this year, including religious education and music.
“This is likely to result in another difficult year of trainee recruitment for these subjects.”
Earlier this year the government announced a levelling up premium payment for Stem (science, technology, engineering and maths) early-career teachers, with those eligible able to claim up to £9,000 over three years.
Speaking about today’s bursary announcement, schools minister Jonathan Gullis said: “As a former teacher, I know that investing in our teachers is investing in young people. These generous bursaries and scholarships will attract the brightest and the best into teaching.
“Shoring up the talent pipeline to teach vital subject areas such as Stem and languages will, in turn, equip young people with the knowledge and skills they need to secure a bright future, and ensure that our economy remains globally competitive.”
‘Severe’ shortage of teachers
Geoff Barton, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “While we welcome any action to address the fact that schools and colleges are experiencing a severe shortage of teachers, this increase in bursaries for certain secondary subjects only scratches the surface of the crisis.
“The underlying issue is that salary levels are not competitive enough because of government austerity policies, which have eroded the real value of school teachers’ pay by a fifth over the past decade. This year’s pay award is significantly below inflation and there is no additional government funding to schools for them to be able to pay for the cost of this award.”
Mr Barton added that this situation is compounded by workload pressures caused by “chronic underfunding of schools”, which he said contribute to nearly a third of teachers leaving the profession within five years of qualifying.
