Listen to this story Members can listen to an AI-generated audio version of this article. 1.0x Audio narration uses an AI-generated voice. 0:00 0:00 Become a member to listen to this article Subscribe Teacher training leaders warn the profession is at risk of becoming “elitist” with students from poorer backgrounds becoming “priced out” as the cost of living soars. The Universities’ Council for the Education of Teachers (UCET) is warning ministers this week that trainees are struggling to make ends meet and many could be put off applying. Postgraduates can take out student loans to cover training fees, and maintenance loans to help with living expenses. But UCET members report more are taking on part-time work and relying on university handouts and clothing banks. It comes as fuel, food and accommodation prices rise, with inflation expected to soar further. UCET chair Claire Ball-Smith said more students were “struggling to make ends meet in order to become teachers, in a way that we haven’t seen before.” She and Aimee Quickfall, the vice-chair of UCET’s primary forum, have published a blog in which they ask: “Are we currently pricing out some graduates from entering the profession? “What research is being done on the lived experience of student teachers who are not given financial support to train? “Do we run the risk of making our profession elitist, with only those with financial support able to successfully navigate the non-academic demands of the ITE training period?” ‘Rise in poverty’ Ball-Smith, the director of initial teacher education (ITE) at the University of York, said cases of poverty have risen since the pandemic. “Simple things like food, petrol, rent … we notice students are struggling to balance out each month, even with their student finance.” Postgraduates living away from home can borrow up to £10,830 a year to cover maintenance costs outside London, and up to £14,135 in the capital. But Quickfall, the initial teacher training director at Durham University, said this “just doesn’t go as far as it used to”. Family members who might previously have provided support “perhaps don’t have the money to do that anymore”. The National Union of Students (NUS) said it was aware of PGCE students using food banks. Lewis Wilson, its vice–president, said student funding was more than a decade behind financial reality. “Rent can be almost 100 per cent of our loans and we are facing rising bills like everyone else.” UCET is concerned some would-be teachers have been “priced out” and are not applying for training, particularly courses that attract no or small bursaries. The DfE axed four initial teacher training bursaries this year and reduced funding for five others. Details of 2027-28 bursaries are yet to be confirmed. Lack of data In 2022, the DfE appeared to have begun collecting figures on whether ITT candidates who attended school in England previously received free school meals (FSM) – a proxy for measuring disadvantage. A notice on the DfE website explained the question aimed to “assess the impact of social-economic background on the chances of a successful application”. Nothing was published, but the National Foundation for Educational Research obtained the data last year as part of a wider study on ethnic disparities. Researchers found 37 per cent of those previously eligible for FSM were rejected from teacher training, compared with 26 per cent of those not eligible. The reasons were not examined. Teacher trainers net top marks in new Ofsted inspections Meanwhile 2024 research by John Jerrim for Ofsted and the UCL Institute of Education found those eligible for FSM while studying their GCSEs were “roughly half as likely to enter teaching”. However, it said “the vast majority of this gap” could be explained by differences in grades. This suggested prospective trainees from disadvantaged backgrounds faced another barrier in the form of “lower levels of academic achievement at school”. Laying out plans to grow the workforce by 6,500 teachers earlier this year, the government specifically said it wants to ensure the workforce “reflects the diversity of our communities”. But UCET said there was a “pressing” need for more data, which Ball-Smith said was vital if the government was serious about diversifying the profession. More trainees working Universities report trainee teachers are increasingly turning to part-time work. The NUS found in 2024 that three in five of students in general worked alongside their studies, with 70 per cent of those saying the work was having a negative impact on their studies. “Very few” trainees worked on top of their studies a decade ago, said Quickfall. “I remember advising them to give up part-time work so they wouldn’t be tired at school. “Now I wouldn’t dream of doing that, because so many could not afford to be on their programmes without working. Lots have more than one job.” Ball-Smith has also seen a rise in the numbers of PGCE students with part-time work. “A lot do bar work in the evenings, which means they haven’t got time to plan lessons or do their assignments. “They’re trying to juggle those things whilst doing a really intense course. It’s difficult to balance that alongside a part-time job, because it’s really a full-time course.” GoFundMe and JustGiving have reported rises in the number of teacher trainees using their platforms to help fund their studies. Numbers remain low, but GoFundMe reported 34 fundraisers in 2025, up from 19 in 2024 and 24 in 2023. JustGiving reported 108 such pages in 2025, up from 87 in 2024. At the University of Cumbria, the proportion of teacher trainees in the highest deprivation quintiles has risen from 40 per cent in 2019-20, to 45 per cent last year. But Mike Toyn, head of external quality and compliance, said the university – which operates in Carlisle, Lancaster and London – worked hard to widen participation and support “a broad range of applicants”. “We need to think about how … we remove barriers and continue to support that diverse teaching population, because we want it to be representative, inclusive and open to all.” Travel expenses Trainee teachers face specific cost pressures linked to the government requirement to complete at least six months of school placements. Providers try to limit travel distances to 90 minutes each way, but Quickfall said expenses “vary massively” and were especially challenging in rural areas. Students are expected to fund the travel cost themselves. Some universities offer practical help, such as car sharing, or funding in exceptional circumstances. “But potentially we’re facing a point where there’ll be institutions that can’t afford to do that for everybody who needs it,” said Quickfall. Ball-Smith said York had a fund to help students with emergency car repairs or “prohibitive” travel costs. She recalled one trainee who said car repairs “meant that without an emergency loan from the university, they would need to withdraw” from their training. “These situations are becoming more common and even with a solution, are stressful.” Jim Pugh, head of Sheffield Institute of Education at Sheffield Hallam University, said ITE students there are supported with the cost of travel to school placements, “however that comes at a cost to the Institute and long-term may be unsustainable”. He too is seeing “the strain [of] the cost of living” on teacher trainees, who “struggle” to balance part-time work with studies. “We would welcome sector change and recognition of the strain ITE students are facing, and supporting ITE providers to maintain high quality teacher supply,” he added. Clothing for placements was also a “significant outlay”, said Quickfall, particularly for those training to be secondary teachers. “Some schools have quite strict dress codes for staff. You have to have a suit jacket, smart trousers, shoes.” She said some SCITTs and universities have set up clothing banks. Accommodation and food prices also remain high. A 2023 Higher Education Policy Institute report found average rent across 10 university cities was £7,475 a year – 14.6 per cent higher than 2021-22. They later found that in London, average student rent soared by 31 per cent between 2021-22 and 2024-25. Emotional toll UCET warned financial pressures were affecting wellbeing. “We’re referring a lot more people to student support for counselling,” said Quickfall. “The rates have gone up exponentially.” Trainees might be “absolutely determined they want to become a teacher, but their circumstances are such that they are literally sometimes awake at night thinking ‘I’m just exhausted’.” She recalled a student who faced “significant pressure” last year as petrol prices soared. “They said ‘I’m trying to work after school most evenings as well as on the weekends, but I’m just getting increasingly exhausted and financially stressed. I’m generally worried whether I can carry on.’ “I don’t think that’s unusual.” Chartered College of Teaching to review decade-old CPD standards Ball-Smith said over summer five of her students who had accepted places indicated that they could not afford to come – similar numbers to the past five years. She said there was a “risk of making our profession really elitist”. There could come a point where applicants could only enter the profession if they had parental support or other financial means. “If we’re doing that, we are really missing something massive, aren’t we? There is a generation of kids out there that need to see role models from their own backgrounds.” Quickfall said she had not heard of any trainee withdrawing during the course because of finances. But she put this down to providers’ support .“There’s only so much that we can do before that before that will happen and becomes normal.” The DfE was approached for comment.