Equity in teacher education: Addressing diversity from ITT to leadership

Originally published in Impact (issue 26), the journal of the Chartered College of Teaching. Republished with kind permission from Norfolk Research School.

Teaching is a uniquely rewarding profession, bringing with it the chance to change students’ lives and influence their futures. However, the diversity of the teaching workforce doesn’t reflect that of the student body in most schools. For example, men are twice as likely to take on leadership positions as women, even though women comprise most of the teaching workforce (McShane and Sheppard, 2024). Gaps also remain in representation among racial and ethnic minorities (Kotonya et al., 2025), disabled individuals and LGBTQ+ professionals (Ozolins et al., 2021). The reasons for these gaps are both societal and systemic. However, certain traditional expectations of the profession and those within it exacerbate these gaps, particularly at key points in the career of a typical teacher. Therefore, we need to implement thoughtful and purposeful recruitment, retention and career development strategies to address these disparities.

This perspective aims to synthesise recent evidence on diversity in teaching and propose practical steps for leaders and ITT (initial teacher training) providers to support equity across career stages. It outlines a typical career path in teaching, from applying to ITT through to school and system leadership, and considers what the evidence tells us about the characteristics of those who progress at each stage.

The characteristics that this article will address are as follows:

Non-white/religious/racial/ethnic minorities
Disabled people
Neurodivergent people
LGBTQ+ people
Mothers and/or primary caregivers
People experiencing menopause.

There is little available research that addresses the intersections of these characteristics, so these are necessarily broad brushstrokes.

Initial teacher training: At-risk group – non-white/religious/racial/ethnic minorities

Despite being overrepresented among applicants for ITT, people of colour are considerably underrepresented in teaching (Kotonya et al., 2025), as well as being less likely to be promoted at almost every stage of their teaching journey (Beckles-Raymond, 2020). In fact, in 2021 – 22, 60 per cent of schools in England had an all-white teaching staff, with 86 per cent of schools in England having an all-white senior leadership team (Worth et al., 2022).

If people of colour are more likely to apply for initial teacher training but less likely to achieve QTS (qualified teacher status), then what happens?

There are multiple unseen barriers to successful recruitment to ITT for certain demographics, including people of colour being less likely to reach their potential in the current education system and financial constraints for non-salaried, non-bursaried routes (Beckles-Raymond, 2020). If someone did not grow up in this country, then they may not understand the English school system. If someone’s parents did not go to university, then the process of applying to postgraduate study or an apprenticeship may not be straightforward.

The complexity of the ITT application process and a lack of support and guidance can particularly disadvantage some of these prospective applicants. Pre-application support focusing on demystifying the English school system or coaching on formal language to use on an application could make a huge difference to those who did not grow up within these systems. Accessibility accommodations provided as standard at interview could also help to address cultural sensitivities around disclosure of disabilities.

Actions for ITT providers:

Pre-interview, clearly communicate expectations, e.g. what to wear
Offer interview practice or provide the interview questions in advance
Offer the choice of online or in-person interviews
If possible, provide accessibility accommodations (e.g. quiet space, private space, any materials available in accessible format) as standard
Model acknowledgement/acceptance of neurodivergence, e.g. allowing fidget toys
Anonymise applications and invest in unconscious bias training for staff
Aim for a visibly diverse interview panel (while balancing this with the additional workload that this may cause for diverse staff)
Wherever possible, request that the trainee’s in-school mentor shares an aspect of their identity
Risk-assess barriers and issues that trainees might face on a school placement
Assess and address the trainee’s likely physical and psychological safety
Survey current and recent participants to learn about their lived experience of the process, and use this to drive future planning.

ECTs and classroom teachers: At-risk groups – LGBTQ+ people, disabled people

The UK is currently ranked 22^nd out of 49 European countries for LGBTQ+ safety (ILGA-Europe, 2025). It is the responsibility of school leadership as employers and colleagues to ensure that LGBTQ+ teachers are safe in school.

This might mean revisiting behaviour, equality and dignity at work policies and ensuring that they’re fit for purpose, truly inclusive and robustly enforced every time. School leaders could consult the people directly affected by these policies and ask them about their lived experience of the policies being enforced. Students and their parents/carers should be explicitly taught to be respectful and appreciative of diversity in all its forms, and a zero-tolerance approach to discrimination and harassment should be modelled by all staff.

According to Ozolins et al. (2021), disabled teachers are less likely to feel comfortable during the recruitment process, less likely to feel confident that the leadership team would take action to prevent discrimination and less likely to feel valued in the workplace (with disabled women the least likely to feel valued).

Leaders should specifically consider how far disabled teachers are fully accommodated in their school:

Are reasonable adjustments made proactively?
Is there a budget for equipment to allow them to do their job effectively?
Is there flexibility to amend lesson plans and classroom resources to make them more accessible?

Classroom teacher to middle leader: At risk-groups – mothers/primary caregivers, neurodivergent people

Women in their 30s are the largest group leaving the teaching profession, citing excessive workload, family commitments and a lack of flexible working arrangements (McShane and Sheppard, 2024). We know that women make up most of the teaching workforce, and we also know that primary caregivers are more likely to be female (even before considering further intersections of identity). If there was equity of opportunity in education, then men wouldn’t be twice as likely to progress into leadership.

Around one in seven UK adults are neurodivergent. Thirty-one per cent of respondents to Zurich UK (2024) reported that job applications were not taken any further once they had disclosed their neurodiversity. A fifth reported being laughed at because of their neurodiversity (Zurich UK, 2024). Building transparency and accessibility into the recruitment process to leadership as standard would help neurodivergent colleagues to regard teaching as a sustainable career in which they can progress.

Actions for leaders:

Examine and update where needed the school’s parental leave policy
Consider the barriers to remaining in the profession that face primary caregivers and neurodivergent people
Consider fully implemented flexible working policies that include hybrid PPA (planning, preparation and assessment) time, part-time and job-share opportunities; consider working with Flexible Working Ambassador Schools or MATs (multi-academy trusts).

Middle leader to senior leader: At-risk groups – mothers/primary caregivers, people experiencing menopause

At this point in the teacher career journey, based on the evidence discussed, the diversity of the profession is significantly narrower than at the start.

A Hewlett-Packard study found that women applied for promotion only when they believed that they met 100 per cent of the requirements on the job description, while men applied when they met 60 per cent (Catlin, 2025). Job descriptions for senior leadership roles are often very detailed, with extensive lists of personal skills and experience on the person specification. The longer the list, the less likely it is that members of underrepresented groups will apply.

Interviews for senior leadership roles tend to be similarly elaborate: frequently a two-day process, with various assignments, panels and often a task to be completed in the evening between the two days. This overnight task is particularly problematic: it disadvantages people with disabilities or chronic illnesses. It also disproportionately disadvantages women, as they are more likely to be mothers or primary caregivers.

In the past few years, all stages of menopause have finally begun to be discussed more openly, with symptoms – both physical and emotional – being talked about and beginning to be understood by those not experiencing it. People experiencing menopause are at a stage in their life when they’re more likely to be in a senior position or seeking one. Three-quarters of respondents to an NUT survey had not disclosed symptoms of the menopause to their line manager for reasons including not wanting their manager to think that their performance could be affected, having a younger – or male – manager and concerns about confidentiality. Some respondents reported being bullied and some had been forced to take long-term sick leave (Brewis et al., 2017).

Being a school leader is a difficult, high-pressure job, but flexible working isn’t just for lower-responsibility roles. Headteachers can job-share or work to a hybrid model, and they should model healthy and sustainable working patterns to their staff that are compatible with family life in all its diverse forms.

At this point – senior leadership and headship – the profession is likely to have lost (in many cases permanently) a disproportionate number of teachers with the characteristics named at the start of this article – some to outright discrimination, but many more to the fact that teaching as a profession has not embraced the same modernisation as many other sectors. Statistically, most people remaining in the profession are white and cisgender, with no disabilities or neurodivergence, and not a mother or primary caregiver.

If the status quo perpetuates, school leaders all look much the same. How confident can we be that these leaders are in that position on completely objective merit? There is no way of knowing whether those leaders are the best person for the job when statistically they are likely to be the only person able to apply for the job.

Actions for leaders:

Model inclusive language
Provide private space for people of all religions to pray
Offer a private, lockable space for lactation
Ensure that all policies, flexibility and accommodations continue as teachers progress into middle and senior leadership positions.

Alternative system leadership: Groups retained – mothers/primary caregivers, people experiencing menopause

Fortunately, there are other ways in which to be a system leader. For example, SCITT (school-centred ITT), Teaching School Hub and Research School directors don’t necessarily do these roles full-time, and many balance this responsibility alongside active teaching or school leadership roles. Roles such as these can offer better flexibility, hybrid or home working, more regular hours and the opportunity to mould the role to a person’s needs and preferences.

This increased flexibility means that the sector may retain mothers and primary caregivers and people experiencing menopause. Unfortunately, the other underrepresented groups likely left the profession before they got to a level of seniority that would allow them to be considered for these roles – before they reached the level of seniority required to influence change to a system that did not make them feel that they belonged.

The three demographics remaining are now the people responsible for setting organisational policies. They are responsible for senior leadership recruitment. And perhaps more importantly, they are the people responsible for recruiting, interviewing and training the next generation of teachers.

Susi Waters is Operations Manager at Norfolk Research School and the Julian Teaching School Hub, based at Notre Dame High School (NDHS). As part of her role, Susi has developed and delivered training on Trans Awareness in the Workplace, Wellbeing and Managing Exam Stress, and DEI in the Teaching Workforce. She is also the DEI link between the Research Schools Network and the Education Endowment Foundation for the East of England and East Midlands Region and has previously been part of the Research Schools Network’s Developing Diverse Voices focus group.

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