You need a bachelor’s degree in any subject to teach in primary, secondary and special schools in England.
For secondary teacher training, your provider will want to make sure you have a good knowledge of the subject you’re applying to teach.
If you have a bachelor’s degree, you can do postgraduate teacher training to get qualified teacher status (QTS).
Teacher training courses usually take 9 months full-time, or 18 to 24 months part-time. Most teacher training courses start in September, with a small number of courses starting on other dates throughout the year.
Teacher training course providers
Your postgraduate teacher training course might be provided by:
- a university, sometimes referred to as university-led training
- a school or group of schools, sometimes referred to as school-led training
Your teacher training course may also be provided by a company or charity. For example, Teach First is a charitable organisation that provides teacher training.
Some providers are ‘accredited’ – this means they’ve been approved by the Department for Education (DfE) to run teacher training courses.
Providers who have not been accredited can also run courses if they’re in a partnership with an organisation that has. For example, you might see a school running a course that has a university as their ‘accredited provider’.
What does teacher training involve?
All teacher training involves mostly classroom placements with some theoretical learning.
This means that even if your course provider is a university, you’ll still do placements in schools. And if your course provider is a school, you might still do your theoretical learning in a university.
Regardless of your course provider, all teacher training involves at least 2 school placements over a minimum of 24 weeks.
Find out what to expect during your teacher training
You'll learn a lot about yourself during your teacher training year, and it's the most rewarding journey to be on.
Where will my training take place?
Because all teacher training must involve placements in at least 2 schools, your training will not all happen in the same place. Some courses may also have a separate location for your theoretical learning.
Your course provider will probably not be able to confirm your exact placement locations until they’ve allocated all training places on their course. But you can talk to them beforehand to get an idea.
How much does teacher training cost?
The maximum tuition fee for postgraduate teacher training for a UK applicant is:
- £9,535 per year for a full-time course
- £7,145 per year for a part-time course
You can apply for tuition fee and maintenance loans, even if you’ve previously applied for and received a student loan.
You may be eligible for extra financial support if:
- you train to teach certain subjects
- you’re disabled
- you’re a parent or carer
- you’re a veteran
- you’re eligible for a salaried teacher training course
Find out how to fund your training
How to choose your teacher training course
There are some differences in postgraduate teacher training courses.
