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Secondary school teachers teach children from 11 to 16, or up to 19 in schools with sixth forms.
You could work: evenings; attending events or appointments
There will be
4.3% more Secondary school teacher jobs in 2027.
In your local area
In this role you could:
You could work at a school, at a college, at a pupil referral unit or at a special needs school.
Your working environment may be physically and emotionally demanding.
You can get into this job through:
Undergraduate degree
You can do an undergraduate degree that leads to qualified teacher status (QTS), for example:
Postgraduate certificate
If you already have a bachelor's degree without qualified teacher status, you can complete a postgraduate certificate in education (PGCE). This can be done at university or through a training programme based in a school.
More teacher training options
There are more training options if you want to change career or specialise in teaching certain subjects.
You'll usually need:
You can do a degree level teaching apprenticeship if you have a degree and want to teach in a secondary school.
You'll usually need:
You could start as a teaching assistant or learning mentor and do a part time degree. You could then move onto a postgraduate teaching course to qualify as a teacher.
You'll find it helpful to get some experience of working with young people, though this is not essential.
You could volunteer at a school, do youth work or work on a holiday scheme.
You'll need to:
You can do a subject knowledge enhancement course to improve your understanding of the subject you want to teach.
You can also attend a Get Into Teaching event before you apply to get advice about teaching, funding and the different training routes available. You can attend events in person and online.
You can discover more about how to become a teacher from Get Into Teaching.
You can also search for jobs through the Teaching Vacancies service.
With experience you could:become a special educational needs teacher, further education teacher or move into pastoral care; become a specialist leader of education and support teachers in other schools; move up to be a curriculum leader, head of year, deputy head or headteacher; work for an exam board, local education authority or work in a gallery or museum as an education officer; work freelance as a private tutor