Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, what proportion of students who have received chemistry or physics bursaries for undertaking a PGCE accept a job in a state school at the end of their training; and what proportion of those teachers who remain in such employment after five years.

The Department’s published data shows that the rate of progression into teaching for those who receive a bursary is very similar to the rate of progression for all trainees. Of those who trained in 2020/21, the Department provisionally estimates that 74% of chemistry postgraduate trainees and 73% of physics postgraduate trainees who were awarded Qualified Teacher Status (QTS) and were eligible for a bursary will be employed as a teacher in a state funded school in England within 16 months of the end of the academic year. The equivalent employment rate for all postgraduate trainees, whether they received a bursary or not, is 73%.

The Department does not currently hold data showing the employment rate of bursary recipients after five years.

For trainees starting Initial Teacher Training in the 2023/24 academic year, the Department is providing a £27,000 tax free bursary and a £29,000 scholarship in mathematics, physics, chemistry and computing. The Department is also providing a Levelling Up Premium of up to £3,000 tax free annually for mathematics, physics, chemistry, and computing teachers in the first five years of their careers who work in disadvantaged schools, including in Education Investment Areas. These incentives are designed to support the recruitment and retention of teachers in these subjects, and to encourage them to work in the schools and areas that need them most.