DfE’s staff workforce census: what's changed?

The Department for Education’s School Workforce Census, a crucial annual event that takes place in November, gathers essential data about the school workforce in state-funded schools in England from schools and local authorities. This year’s update, a significant milestone, provides comprehensive information on teaching and support staff, their characteristics, teacher retention and pay, qualifications, and details of the subjects taught in secondary schools.

We are delighted to share our comprehensive annual update on teacher and education staff retention in our new report; Staff Retention in Academies. In this report, we conduct an in-depth analysis of staff experiences, examining them through various lenses such as protected characteristics, school characteristics, and trends over time. This meticulous analysis provides a robust understanding of the challenges and opportunities in our workforce. ¹

1. It’s important to note that the School Workforce Census data collection doesn’t include information from Independent schools, non-maintained special schools, sixth-form colleges, and further education establishments ↩︎

In this blog, we will examine some of the data from the DfE’s School Workforce Census and our very own Staff Experience and Wellbeing Survey Dataset, comparing the similarities and differences in staff experience in education.

Teacher and Teaching Assistant Recruitment

Data from the DfE’s School Workforce Census for the 2022/2023 academic year shows that there are now 468,693 teachers in the sector, which is an increase of 300 since last year and an increase of 27,300 since 2010 when the school workforce census began. It also highlights that there are now 282,925 teaching assistants in the sector, an increase of 1,800 since last year and 61,400 since 2011 when the census began collecting support staff information.

While the School Workforce Census data show a growth in the gross number of teachers, the pupil-to-teacher ratio has worsened, with 20.8 pupils per teacher compared to 20.7 the year before for State-funded nursery and primary schools, 16.8 pupils to each teacher in State-funded secondary schools and 6.5 pupils per teacher compared to 6.4 the year before in State-funded special schools or PRU’s. This point was recently highlighted by Jack worth from the National Foundation for Educational Research and Paul Whiteman, general secretary of the NAHT, who stated that as a sector, “We have 18,000 more pupils in our schools this year, but the number of new teachers has fallen by almost 4,000”.

*Staff Workforce Census Data 2022/23

*Staff Workforce Census Data 2022/23

Looking at our Staff Experience and Wellbeing Survey Dataset, we can see that in 2022/23 Academic, 43% of staff we surveyed considered resigning “sometimes,” “often,” or “constantly” in the three months before they responded. This academic year (2023/2024 so far), 44% of staff we surveyed considered resigning “sometimes,” “often,” or “constantly” in the three months before they responded.

*Edurio Staff Experience and Wellbeing Data 2022/23

A notable change is that teaching assistants are 3% more likely so far this academic year to consider resigning constantly, often, or sometimes compared to 2022/2023, which is the largest increase compared with any other roles. For senior leaders, we saw an improvement for the second year in a row, with 28% of senior leaders considering resigning constantly, often, or sometimes compared to 30% in 2022/23 and 31% in 2021/22.

*Edurio Staff Experience and Wellbeing Data 2022/23

Reasons For Considering Resigning

In our Staff Experience and Wellbeing Survey, we ask the question, “What has made you consider resigning? Please select all that apply”. In our new report, we explore the responses to this question. Teachers’ top reported reasons for resigning include overwhelming workload, poor work-life balance and feeling undervalued. For teaching assistants, Feeling undervalued is the top reported reason for considering resigning, followed by Lack of staffing and Low staff morale in the workplace.

considering resignation due to overwhelming workload, poor work-life balance, and feeling undervalued. Addressing these issues is crucial for improving staff retention and creating a more supportive and sustainable educational environment. For a detailed analysis, refer to our Staff Retention in Academies report.