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Department for Education · Education

Recruit 6,500 new teachers

Recruit and retain 6,500 additional expert teachers across mainstream secondary and special schools and further-education colleges by the end of this Parliament.

Tracker assessment
Methodology statusOn track
Tracker interpretationPositive
Current evidence4,654 additional FTE
Reporting periodSchool and FE workforce releases available by 4 June 2026

What the evidence shows

FactThe 4 June 2026 update combined the latest school and further-education workforce results and reported more than 70% of the pledge delivered.

Calculation3,008 + 1,646 = 4,654 additional FTE; 4,654 ÷ 6,500 × 100 = 71.6%

AssessmentThe latest official update reports 71.6% of the target, with 1,846 FTE remaining. The end-of-Parliament deadline remains non-fixed.

Limitations

  • The total combines school and further-education collections with different workforce definitions and publication cycles.
  • Further-education data have coverage limitations for some contract types, documented in the delivery plan.
  • “Additional” is a net workforce increase against the 2023–24 baseline, not a count of individual recruits.

Money allocated, an announcement or an activity is not treated by itself as evidence of delivery. Timing and correlation do not establish causation.

Evidence and revision trail

Baseline: 284,626 FTE in 2023–24: 245,805 in eligible schools plus 38,821 in further education

Target: 6,500 additional FTE teachers

Next milestone: Next annual school and further-education workforce releases (2027-06-01)