Education Workforce Council

The number of registered school teachers has continued to decline year on year since 2010 with a 9.6% drop between then and 2020 (38,896 in 2010; 35,171 in 2020).

The majority are female (75.5%). There has been a gradual decrease in the proportion of male teachers from 28.1% in 2002 to 24.5% in 2020.

The age profile of school teachers continues to be healthy with 46% under the age of 40 and 30% between 40 and 50.

1.3 % of school teachers declared themselves as either Black, Asian or a minority ethnicity (BAME) and 91.2% White. (6.2% unknown). .

62.6% declared their national identity as Welsh and 22.6% as British. (5.9% unknown)

The trend of school teachers who are Welsh speakers (33.6%) or are able to work through the medium of Welsh (27.2%) has continued to remain fairly static with little variance year on year. (3.8% unknown in both)

In Wales, qualified teacher status is non age range or subject specific. Of the secondary school teachers that teach English, Mathematics or Welsh, 75.2%, 78.6% and 73% respectively are trained in the subject they teach. In the foundation subjects, around 80% of secondary practitioners are trained in the subjects they teach, with the exception of Information Technology (40.4%).

The number of registered school learning support workers has increased by 15.5% since 2017 to 38,594 in 2020.

A higher proportion (86.5%) are female in comparison to the other registration groups. The next highest is school teachers.

14.6% are under 25 years of age which is considerably higher than school teachers with 3.6% falling within this age range.

3.3% have declared their ethnicity as Black, Asian or a minority ethnicity and 61.5% as White. 39.6% of school learning support workers declared that their national identity is Welsh. (34.3% unknown in both)

19.1% are able to speak Welsh and 16.2% have declared that they are able to work through the medium of Welsh. (34.3% and 34.7% unknown)

The number registered as FE teachers has increased by 4.7% since 2018.

The gender split is more balanced than the other registrant groups; 58.9% female, 41.1% male.

The FE workforce is older than the school workforce, with 45.1% aged 50 and over in comparison to 24.8% of school teachers and 38.3% of WBL practitioners.

71.1% of FE teachers declared their ethnicity as White. 42.3% declared their national identity as Welsh and 21.5% declared that they were British. (21.3% unknown in both)

16.2% are fluent or fairly fluent Welsh speakers and 11.3% are able to work through the medium of Welsh. (20.3% unknown in both)

82.7% of FE teacher records include qualification information (17.3% are unknown). Of the 82.7% with a qualification recorded, 87.9% are at level 6 or above.

The highest proportion of FE teachers trained in the subject they teach are those teaching Religious Studies, History, Art, Education and Childcare Development, Psychology and Law with over 66% having qualifications in these subjects.

The number registered within the FE learning support worker category has also increased since 2018 by 11.4%.

The majority of FE learning support workers are female (69.1%).

FE learning support workers are a younger workforce than FE teachers in that 64.7% are under 50 compared with 54.9% of FE teachers. 20.3% of FE learning support workers are aged under 30.

4.2% have declared their ethnicity as either Black, Asian or a minority ethnicity and 76.4% as White.
45.6% have declared their national identity as Welsh and 24.2% as British. (17.3% and 17.2% unknown).

15.1% are able to speak Welsh and 10.4% have declared that they are able to work through the medium of Welsh. (17.6% and 17.5% unknown).

The number registered in the WBL category has increased since 2018 by 21.5%.

63.2% of WBL practitioners are female and 36.8% are male.

WBL practitioners have a more even distribution in age range with 9.5% under the age of 30, 11.8% aged 60 and over and the other age categories around 26% each (30 to 39, 40 to 49 and 50 to 59).

1.7% of WBL practitioners have declared their ethnicity as either Black, Asian or a minority ethnicity and 74.8% as White. Similar to other registration categories, Welsh is the most popular declaration in relation to national identity with 45.4%. (21.4% and 21.5% unknown)

12.9% of WBL practitioners who have made a declaration said that they are able to speak Welsh and 8.9% are able to work through the medium of Welsh.

42.4% of WBL practitioners employed in a WBL establishment have their subject information populated. Of those recorded, the most taught subjects are Health and Social Care (13.3%), Business (13.1%), Skills for Work (12.9%).

76.7% of WBL practitioner records include qualification information and of those, 66.1% have a qualification at level 5 or above.

Youth workers and youth support workers are eligible to register with the EWC if they hold one of the mandatory qualifications listed in Regulations. The numbers registered in the youth work sector has been relatively stable since 2018.

Like the other registration categories, the youth work sector is predominately female with 67.8% of youth workers and 63.9% of youth support workers.

The age profile of youth workers and youth support workers is healthy with 23.3% and 19.3% respectively aged over 50 and over.

2.3% of youth workers and 1.8% of youth support workers have declared their ethnicity as either Black, Asian or a minority ethnicity and 65% and 63.3% respectively as White. (30.8% and 33.4% unknown)

43.6% and 46% respectively have declared their national identity as Welsh and 18.6% and 14.9% as British. (30.5% and 33.5% unknown)

4.9% of qualified youth workers and 4.6% of qualified youth support worker declared that they have a disability.

10.3% of youth workers are able to speak Welsh and 7.2% have declared that they are able to work through the medium of Welsh. (29.4% and 30.1% unknown).

14.8% of youth support workers are able to speak Welsh and 11.9% have declared that they are able to work through the medium of Welsh. (33.2% unknown in both)