The supply of secondary school teachers in England is forecast to fall after next year, despite a short-term rise in teacher trainees, new modelling suggests.
The National Foundation for Educational Research’s (NFER) predicts growth in the number of teacher trainees through to 2026-27, but declines of increasing size over the following three years.
Jack Worth, NFER’s education workforce lead, said the modelling shows that “supply is likely to weaken again under current policy”.
Short-term gains in teacher numbers
The analysis suggests that the number of new secondary teachers will rise by around 700 in 2025-26 and 1,600 in 2026-27, largely because of recent increases in trainee recruitment.
However, the NFER’s model predicts secondary school teacher supply will fall by 1,300 in 2027-28, and a further 2,100 and 2,300 in the subsequent two years.
It forecasts that secondary school teacher recruitment as a percentage of the initial teacher training target, under current policy, will be 72 per cent in 2026-27, 54 per cent in 2027-28 and 43 per cent in 2028-29.
Mr Worth said: “Our model suggests that while the recent increase in trainees means the government has more chance of reaching its 6,500 more teachers target, the number of specialist teachers available remains relatively low.”
He added that this means the government is likely to rely on “a combination of more teachers in special schools, alternative provision and further education, and more non-specialist secondary teachers”.
The projected decline will be driven by three main factors, according to the NFER. These are: reduced bursaries in eight secondary subjects; pay awards that slightly weaken teachers’ relative earnings; and a recovering wider labour market reducing incentives to go into teaching.
The biggest declines are forecast in subjects for which bursaries have been cut, including English, biology, geography and modern foreign languages.
In October the Department for Education submitted its evidence to the School Teachers’ Review Body (STRB), recommending a 6.5 per cent pay increase for teachers split across three years.
The STRB is expected to make pay recommendations for the next two years by February. It will also give an indicative pay recommendation for 2028-29.
The DfE will then make its final decision on teacher pay.
Mr Worth said the findings highlight how teacher supply is affected by wider policy decisions, not just pay. “It is reasonable for the STRB to account in its recommendations on pay for whether the DfE is likely to revise bursary policy to alleviate future subject-specific supply concerns,” he said.
Higher pay ‘won’t solve everything’
The NFER says that even if the STRB were to recommend a higher three-year pay award - totalling 9.5 per cent rather than 6.5 per cent - teacher supply would still be more likely to fall than rise after 2026-27.
While the government does not have to follow the STRB’s advice, it has accepted its recommendations for the past two pay awards.
Mr Worth said higher pay “could bring longer-term supply benefits”, but warned it “would not fully offset the impact of bursary cuts and a recovering economy”.
The NFER estimates that the higher-pay scenario would cost an additional £240 million in 2026-27, rising to £1.1 billion by 2028-29, requiring additional government funding to avoid cuts elsewhere in school budgets.
“The tight fiscal environment means that additional government funding would be required to support schools. Otherwise schools would need to fund the higher pay award through cuts to already-stretched budgets,” Mr Worth said.
Teachers were given a 4 per cent pay rise for the 2025-26 academic year, but schools were expected to find the first 1 per cent of this rise from “efficiencies”.
Mr Worth said the STRB’s focus should be on ensuring that teacher pay at least stays competitive with average earnings, particularly as labour market conditions improve.
Pepe Di’Iasio, general secretary of the Association of School and College Leaders, said: “It is imperative that the STRB recommends a pay award sufficient to ensure that schools have enough teachers in the future, and that the government provides the funding necessary for schools to be able to afford pay awards.”
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