Recommendation 1
DfE should develop cross-sector data and insights across schools and further education colleges, to understand career paths and the unintended impact of sector?focused initiatives, to create a cross-sector approach.
Source · National Audit Office
Teacher workforce: secondary and further education
NAO assesses if DfE is achieving value for money through its work to recruit and retain teachers for secondary schools and further education
Published: 30 Apr 2025
Recommendations: 7
Type: Value for Money
NAO confirmed: 3
Department: Department for Education
Recommendations
Recommendation 2
DfE should collect more comprehensive data on further education teachers by reiterating the importance of providing data returns, and exploring how to build a historical picture.
Recommendation 3
DfE should, as part of its thinking around meeting the 6,500 pledge, fully assess, balance and manage the implications for value for money, affordability, responding to future teaching requirements and demographics, and the extent to which it can deliver its longer-term aims.
Recommendation 4
DfE should, following announcement of the multi-year spending review settlement, provide greater transparency around what the 6,500 pledge means in practice for the school and further education sectors, with a published delivery plan setting out objectives, responsibilities, milestones, and how increases will be measured, and subsequently, publicly report on progress.
Recommendation 5
DfE should extend its evidence base of what works to recruit and retain teachers to include non-financial initiatives, and analyse the relative costs and benefits of initiatives to decide where to prioritise resources.
Recommendation 6
DfE should consider what more it can do to encourage those undertaking teacher training to move into teaching jobs in the state-funded sector, and ensure the right type of students enrol on training, particularly for subjects that are seeing the greatest attrition.
Recommendation 7
DfE should assess the extent to which its further education workforce demand model is fit for purpose and uses the best available data and assumptions, implementing any required changes based on this assessment.