Once, teaching was a reliable route into the middle class. Increasingly, you might need to be middle class before you can afford to become a teacher. In my seventh year of teaching, I’m conscious of how fortunate I am. Not because teaching has made me wealthy – ha! – but because journalism allowed me to build a life beforehand. I could afford a home, financial stability, a family and independence. Without that head start, I’m not sure how I’d have managed today.
Too many of my talented, committed, hard-working younger colleagues still live with their parents well into their late twenties. Others inhabit shared houses where disputes over bills and flatmates provide constant stress. These are graduates doing one of society’s most important jobs, yet renting their own flat, let alone buying one, seems increasingly fantastical. Because getting into teaching is extraordinarily expensive.
Take the traditional PGCE route, which I followed. After three years of university tuition fees, aspiring teachers face another year costing almost £10k in tuition alone. Here’s the extraordinary part: they receive no salary. Nothing. They spend at least 24 weeks on placements across two schools, planning lessons, teaching children and marking work, while also studying pedagogy and writing essays. True, some subjects attract generous tax-free bursaries. Others receive literally nothing. Consider the aspiring English teacher, like me. From this September, the government training bursary disappeared entirely. In 2020, I got £12k, three years ago it was £15k. Meanwhile, someone training to teach maths can receive £29k tax-free. Student loans are available, but borrowing money to survive isn’t the same as earning it.
Teach First offers an alternative: a funded, salaried route paying roughly £24,000 to £35,000 during training, depending on location and role. But there’s a catch. Placements are nationwide and – like young, qualified medics – applicants may have to entirely relocate, leaving family support networks behind. Moving hundreds of miles is easier when Mum and Dad can cover the deposit. Medics face similar pressures. Five or six years of university, expensive accommodation and placements, followed by years of further training and placements far away from potential support structures.
And, once qualified? A new teacher outside London starts on £34,069 before tax, pension contributions and student loan repayments. This, after four years accumulating debt. Try saving while paying £770 monthly for a room in a shared house. Then explain to teenagers why education and hard work are the keys to getting ahead. It’s small wonder that 18 per cent of teachers take on second jobs. Are we creating generations of teachers (and doctors) selected not simply by ability and dedication, but by parental bank balances? Where does this end? Teaching increasingly populated by those with inherited security, wealthy partners or access to the Bank of Mum and Dad. A profession that should promote social mobility risks becoming the preserve of the privileged.
We should raise teachers’ starting salaries to £40,000+ nationally, with proper London weighting. Pay trainees a meaningful allowance, expand maintenance grants and fund relocation costs. Give young renters and first-time buyers genuine help through affordable housing and deposit support. None of this comes cheaply. But, neither does losing talented teachers who cannot afford the profession. And the problem with that is children need to see what could possibly be. They need relatable role models and if the education system does not benefit from a homogeneous workforce then our wider society certainly does not. We tell children education opens doors. How tragic if those delivering it cannot afford a front door of their own.
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