A Blueprint for Renewal Design and Technology Education

A Blueprint for Renewal Design and Technology Education

June 2024

Industry is crying out for people with creative problem solving skills, critical thinking, adaptability and resilience.1 These are the skills that will enable us to build the green and digital economy of the future. Luckily, there is still a space in British school curricula where they are purposefully developed –design education.

Design and technology (D&T) is one of the few spaces in the school curriculum where science and creativity meet and students get to solve real-world problems in innovative ways. People who use design skills are 49% more productive.2 The UK’s design industry itself contributes £97.4bn in GVA and is growing at twice the rate of the economy as a whole3 - it now needs new and diverse talent to lead us forward.

However, D&T is a subject in critical decline – it is a microcosm of wider tensions within creative, technical, and cross-curricular learning across the UK. Over the last decade, British D&T GCSE entries have fallen by 68%, and the number of D&T teachers has halved. The fall in D&T has destabilised the whole subject area, masking steep declines in all art and design subjects and cutting off a vital pipeline for creative and engineering talent into industry.

Without decisive action from government, industry, and education, the subject risks falling into the margins of the curriculum at the very time it is most needed. All young people must be able to access a great design education if they are to develop the creative problem solving, material intelligence, and systems thinking ability they need to thrive.

Our collective recommendations to policymakers

The Government’s Creative Industries Sector Vision4 highlights concerns regarding the fall in D&T, and both the House of Lords Digital and Communications Committee5 and Education for 11–16 Year Olds Committee6 called for the Department for Education to take urgent action to tackle the decline. However, no steps have yet been announced to address the fall in student numbers.

Our recommendations are presented here as a unifying, shared call for action for the first time, building on previous recommendations made by the Institution for Engineering and Technology, the Design & Technology Association, Creative Education Manifesto, EngineeringUK, Save our Subjects and many others.

The incoming government must target change on two fronts:

– In its first year, stem the flow of teachers and students leaving the subject and ensure that D&T’s future as a core curriculum subject is secure.

– By the end of the Parliament to forge an ambitious, forward-looking future for design as the jewel in the crown of a reimagined British education system - a core competency that develops creative problem-solving, technical knowledge, material intelligence, critical thinking and making ability, focused on the needs of our future economy and society.

Key actions to achieve change:

1

Refine and renew the D&T subject content for 11-18-yearolds, aligning it to inclusive innovation and sustainability.

Despite examples of excellent practice across the UK, D&T has struggled to find its place as a modern, high-value subject in most schools. Government and the sector must work together, building on the existing work,7 to implement a curriculum development plan so that D&T truly equips students to address global challenges and meet student, HE, FE, and industry needs. This should be supported by improving awareness among young people and their carers of the huge range of career opportunities design opens up.

2

Develop and implement a funded strategy for D&T teacher recruitment, training, CPD and retention.

There is an acute and growing shortage of specialist teachers across the subject area. D&T teacher recruitment and retention is at crisis level, with only 25% of the D&T recruitment target met each year. This means millions earmarked for training bursaries goes unspent every year. The Department for Education must now reinvest this money – worth approximately £20 million annually –in tangible interventions to support and develop the profession,8 for instance, developing an equivalent to the Engineers Teach Physics.

3Consider D&T in any reform of school accountability, performance and inspection measures.

Together the English Baccalaureate (EBacc) subject set and Progress 8 accountability measure have contributed to the marginalisation of D&T, among other creative and technical subjects, in schools. Policymakers should explore how reform of these measures could support design education.9 A review of secondary school Ofsted assessment criteria could better incentivise all schools to teach a broad and balanced curriculum would also be beneficial, building on the success Ofsted has achieved at primary level. Additionally, the government should push for creative thinking to be permanently embedded in the OECD’s PISA framework so that design excellence is appropriately measured and valued.

4

Put design at the heart of a reformed broad, balanced and creative curriculum.

Design suffers from exclusive delivery as a subject when the concepts and skills it develops are cross-curricular in nature.10 D&T’s decline is symptomatic of a curriculum that isn’t designed to adequately deliver our future skills needs. The government must conduct an ambitious and holistic curriculum and assessment review. In addition to the specialised design subjects (D&T and art, craft and design), design’s role as a foundational ‘skill for life’ like oracy should be woven through all subjects, with design-based challenges used to bring other subjects alive through applying a creative, hands-on, problemsolving approach to real-world issues.

All these actions must be underpinned by a fundamental culture change within educational policy to recognise the value of both creativity and skills-based learning.

These recommendations are based on a roundtable of 30 design education voices, convened by the Design Council and Creative Industries Council in 2023, alongside five collaborative Design Council cross-sector sessions over 2023 and 2024.

The recommendations have been developed and aresupported by:

Key facts

Entries to design and technology GCSE in England have declined 67% between 2011-23,

67%

...compared with Scotland’s fall of 24%, and only 4% in Northern Ireland.11 On average, 44% of English students (280,000 entries) took a D&T GCSE in 2009, but this fell to just 13% of students (78,000 entries) in 2023.12

Far fewer students in England are also taking D&T at A level.

achieved a D&T A-level in 2023, down from 15,244 students in 2010.13 There is an annual decline of approximately 5-6% year-on-year.14

Pupils who did not enter a D&T GCSE were very unlikely to continue studying design and technology post-16 (only 1.6% do).15

1.6%

Art and design qualifications appear more stable, but this stability is propped up by students moving across from D&T.

9,010 + 5 %

Across the UK, there were 188,193 GCSE entries in 2010 and 198,302 entries in 2023 (+5%). Art and design A-Level entries show a decline from 46,054 in 2010 to 43,464 in 2023 (-6%).16

40%

Regionally D&T uptake is uneven, with entries ranging from nearly 40% of pupils taking D&T at GCSE in Herefordshire compared to just 4% in Middlesbrough.17

While in 2023, D&T GCSE numbers were stable for the first time,18 there was a reduction in the numbers taking art and design.19

A Level entries for both D&T and art and design continued to fall. Without specific changes to encourage take-up, the long-term declining trend in D&T is showing no sign of reversing.20 2023

6,500

The number of D&T teachers has halved in the last decade, from just under 15,000 in 2009 to less than 6,500 qualified teachers today.21

There is an annual decline of 6.5% in line with shortfalls in recruitment, poor retention, and demographic trends of retirement.22 In 2022/23, 21% of D&T teaching hours were taught by non-specialists, rising by 4.8% since last year the highest rise of any subject.23

Postgraduate initial teacher training recruitment has continually fallen short of targets for design and technology subjects, with actual recruitment accounting for just 25% of the target in 2022/23.24

25%

Art and Design Initial Teacher Education recruitment is as low as 44% of the target.25 It is unclear to what extent the decline in teachers and GCSE entries are drivers of each other.26

Forging a positive future for D&T

With a new Parliament soon to begin, and building on the momentum of the Creative Industries Sector Vision, there is renewed energy behind getting creative and technical education right. This briefing sets out the causes, impact, and solutions to restoring the strength of Design & Technology in schools and ensuring all secondary school pupils can access a great design education.

About D&T and Art, craft and design

Design and technology (D&T) is a national curriculum subject in all UK nations. Using creativity and imagination, pupils design, make, prototype and test products that solve real problems within a variety of contexts, considering their own and others’ needs, wants and values.27 It is a subject which teaches applied creativity and empathy.

Art and design is a distinct national curriculum subject. Its study enables pupils to understand, appreciate and contribute to a dimension of life that taps into and expresses human innovation, imagination and thought.28 When studying the subject, pupils can specialise in different areas of practical making including painting, sculpture, photography, textiles and graphic design.29 The subject has a significant craft element so will be referred to throughout the paper as ‘art, craft and design’.

Art, craft and design and D&T have complementary but distinct roles to play in education, society and industry. Both strongly develop creative problemsolving skills. D&T has a greater focus on applied and functional solutions, often in response to tightly defined challenges or ‘design briefs’. This also means D&T tends toward more specific technical knowledge around engineering, design, materials and technologies. On the other hand, art, craft and design has a greater focus on creative self-expression, and develops more exploratory,

open-ended, and concept-driven responses from students. Practically, at GCSE there is no written exam in art, craft and design, and the qualification is awarded based 100% on coursework, whereas D&T has 50% examined content. The creative process and a focus on learning through making is what unites both subjects.

D&T and art, craft and design both feed into design careers, as well as a range of other vocations across the creative industries, digital, engineering, architecture, manufacturing and more. Declines in students studying these subjects is likely to constrict the talent pipeline into these industries.

The value of design education

Throughout the paper we refer to ‘design education’. By this we mean learning which develops design capabilities, knowledge and skills. Design can be taught through many different subjects, though today is predominantly taught through D&T and art, craft and design qualifications. Independent organisations like the National Saturday Club, MATT+FIONA, Open City, POoR Collective, and Daydream Believers also support young peoples’ design education inside and outside of school settings. All these learning pathways are important, and when thinking about the future education system, we consider design education as a whole, beyond current subject demarcations.

There are powerful arguments for the value of design education and D&T:

– Design is at the heart of our future green and digital economy. D&T brings together STEM and creative skills through a coherent design process. D&T is one of the few spaces in the school curriculum where science and creativity meet and where indemand ‘Future Skills’ (Kingston University),30 World Economic Forum top skills,31 and ‘Innovation Skills’ (IFaATE/ Innovate UK)32 such as critical thinking, problem-solving, and initiative can be purposefully developed. Curriculum space to learn and apply these capabilities is vital in the context of rapid technological developments like AI. Additionally, the design economy itself is growing at twice the rate of the economy as a whole, and building a net zero economy will create thousands of jobs for engineers and designers. LinkedIn’s Global Green Skills report names sustainable design as one of the fastest growing green skills.33 D&T is a subject with the potential to develop this resilient future talent pipeline.

– People who use design skills are 49% more productive than the average UK worker.34 1 in 7 people use design skills in their work, and designers are 29% more productive than the average UK worker.35 Design is a foundational skill, as much a part of the grammar of life and work as numeracy and oracy are. Design – applying user, customer, citizen or community-centred approaches to creativity and invention to ensure more successful outcomes36 – is fundamental to people in all walks of life and a skill for life all schools must cover. D&T is one of the only opportunities young people have to develop rich design skills such as haptic intelligence, practicality, ingenuity, and empathy.37 The decline of the subject therefore risks exacerbating UK skills

and productivity gaps and depriving the next generation from practicing design as a core ‘skill for life’.

– The decline in D&T deepens the diversity and social mobility crisis in the sector. Today’s design workforce is disproportionately male (77%) and from more privileged backgrounds.38 This matters for social mobility and equity, but also because the design workforce does not represent the consumers they are designing for, which risks damaging social impacts. Encouraging a greater diversity of pupils to take these subjects is a key mechanism we can use to help increase diversity in the sector and inclusive design.39 The decline of D&T in state schools risks entrenching socio-economic inequalities in industry and undermining social mobility.

The causes of decline in D&T

The complex interaction of teacher numbers, school accountability measures, curriculum and qualification reforms, alongside the financial constraints most schools may face,40 and implications of the fast pace of change within the design and engineering professions, make for a complex picture behind the persistent decline.

Significantly, from 1988 to 2002, D&T was a compulsory subject; all students had to study it until they were 16 unless they made an individual case to opt out. When the subject was made non-compulsory, a decline in uptake was clearly expected, though this doesn’t fully explain the continuing rate of decline 20 years later.

While it is still compulsory to study D&T up to 14/KS3, and all students have a theoretical entitlement to study D&T at GCSE, many schools struggle to effectively resource this. While academies are required to offer a broad curriculum, which in theory protects D&T as a

pathway, the flexible definition of creativity allows academies to offer art, craft and design alone. Some schools are either not offering D&T in practice or are steering students away from the subject. In more simple cases, students just aren’t choosing to keep studying the subject after 14.

There are several interacting factors behind this trend.

Teachers and Teaching

In schools where teaching quality is excellent, and school leadership values the subject highly, entries are sometimes able to buck the national trend in decline. This is demonstrated by growing numbers and diversity of pupils choosing D&T at GCSE in leading schools like Upton Hall near Liverpool and Coop Academies Stoke. Yet this is often not the case because:

– Schools struggle to hire specialist teachers. It is extremely challenging for schools to hire qualified D&T teachers. ITT targets are dramatically missed each year, D&T teachers are retiring at a high rate, many Early Career Teachers leave the profession within a few years of qualifying, and vacancies are often near impossible to fill. There was a 2% vacancy rate for D&T teachers in 2022, the highest rate of all subjects except modern foreign languages.41 If a school is not able to hire a qualified head of department, they cannot ensure the quality of provision and so often won’t offer the subject. Multitrust academies sometimes have just one specialist teacher covering multiple schools, with the bulk of lessons being delivered by non-specialists.

– Teachers cannot access the training and support they need. When the D&T curriculum content changed in 2017, poor (or no) access to CPD meant teachers weren’t

always supported to redesign their curricula. Many left the subject, for instance moving to teach their material area through art, craft and design. Without appropriate CPD, teachers struggle to teach new technologies, material areas, design frameworks, maths content, and topics such as sustainability, limiting the breadth and quality of the subject. The quality of teaching is a key factor in students’ attainment,42 as well as shaping GCSE decisions over and above future career aspirations.43

Subject content

The changing landscape within which the D&T sits has also affected student uptake:

– Impact of the 2017 subject reforms. There was a significant drop in D&T GCSE numbers between 2017 and 2019 when a new D&T content was introduced. It merged GCSEs in D&T Systems and Control, Product Design, Textiles, Graphic Communication, and Resistant Materials into a single qualification, and separated Food into Food and Nutrition. The proportion of examined content increased. This meant teachers had to teach a broader range of technical ‘core’ content across all material areas in less depth, as well as one or more material areas in the same or greater depth as before. In some schools, the shift pushed students and teachers to art, craft and design which is 100% coursework end-stage assessed, giving teachers greater control over teaching with no core examined technical content to teach. Qualification numbers for 2019 show a steep fall in D&T qualifications and a corresponding sharp rise in art and design qualifications. The Textiles Skills Centre’s research shows that 32% of schools that offer a textiles GCSE had recently switched from D&T to art and design.44

– Students opting for more vocational or technical alternatives. Sometimes it is suggested that the fall in D&T corresponds with more students choosing to study vocational or technical alternatives such as BTECs, NVQs, apprenticeships or T-Levels. Teacher insights suggest this is not a substantive factor as these technical routes remain challenging to access for most students. The EPI rejects a causal connection between the uptick in vocational engineering qualifications and the decline in D&T.45

While these external changes contribute towards the downward trend in D&T numbers, we also need to look at challenges within the current D&T curriculum:

– Outdated approach to ‘making things’: Consultation with teachers suggests that the main curriculum issues lie at KS3 (year 7 to year 9), in which schools have settled into a routine of ‘making things’.46 Learning often focuses on the end product (pencil case, clock, box etc.) rather than on learning through the designing and making process. There is an insufficient focus on sequentially developing skills and knowledge over those three years, underpinned by a reduction in qualified teaching time. Students’ poor experiences at KS3 frequently puts them off studying the GCSE and serve to reinforce parental stereotypes of the subject being an offer most suited to the less able students.

– GCSE curriculum breadth and quality: The curriculum improves at GCSE/KS4 with a focus on contextual design challenges, experimenting with methodologies and materials, and prototyping. However, there are challenges with the way teachers approach the breadth of examined content. Additionally, maths content makes up 15% of the examination, which is challenging for

some to teach, and may duplicate learning when all students are required to take a GCSE maths at KS4. Exam grade results tend to be lower than art and design.47

– GCSE and A-Level curriculum relevance: As well as a lack of understanding within HE and industry of what capabilities D&T equips students with today, current teaching of the curriculum also isn’t consistently supporting students to gain the knowledge and skills most relevant to industry and HE, across all schools. Foundational design skills such as sketching, modelling, user research, and evaluation and improvement are not always taught consistently to a high standard. And there is a need for an approach to design learning that is centred around purposeful design - designing solutions that work for the planet and people, reflecting how the climate crisis is fundamentally transforming the design industry. Less than 50% of young designers (aged 16-24) PDR and YouGov surveyed for the Design Council believed their formal education had enabled them to design for the environment.48

– Fractured pathway to HE. No design or engineering courses in the UK currently require applicants to have a D&T A-Level or GCSE as to do so would significantly limit applicant numbers. This ‘catch 22’ situation, may itself have become a significant contributor to the decline in student numbers.

Values and perceptions

– Parent, teacher, student, and public perceptions of D&T. At least partly, D&T numbers are falling because students aren’t choosing to study it. The value of design and creative industries professions are not celebrated enough in the public eye to ‘pull’ students in. Parents of more disadvantaged

students are often worried about HE debt and lower salaries associated with design and steer children towards ‘safer’ choices. This is less the case in private schools, where design and creative subjects are seen as vital to a well-rounded education and a successful career. Equally, women, disabled people, and people from ethnic minorities are underrepresented in both the design profession and in the D&T student body.49 This discrepancy exacerbates social mobility and diversity problems in the creative and design industries. Government and industry must work together to engage more young people and their carers with the number of highly rewarding careers design can offer, building on the ‘careers promise’ set out in the Creative Industries Sector Vision.

Educational policy and the wider system

The decline in D&T should be understood in the context of wider educational policy changes which have impacted all subjects:

– School accountability measuresEBacc. The English Baccalaureate (EBacc) is a performance measure for schools which consists of a combination of five subject pillars,50 excluding creative subjects like D&T. Secondary schools are measured on the number of pupils that take GCSEs in these core subjects, as well as how well their pupils do in these subjects. One consequence of the EBacc is that students have limited ‘free’ options (i.e., most only have space to study one creative subject), and school resources are often pulled away from nonEBacc subjects such as D&T.51 Adding D&T to the EBacc is not a silver bullet,52 but wider accountability reform would contribute to subject renewal.

– Ofsted assessment frameworks. Pressure from Ofsted is a driver of how schools allocate resources and inform student choices. In secondary schools Ofsted have prioritised performance in core subjects, subject deep dives are highly stressful for subject leads and arguably encourage more conservative teaching approaches. On the other hand, since Ofsted updated its guidance for primary schools,53 stressing the importance of creative and design subjects within a broad and balanced curriculum, the subject has grown in numbers and stature.54 Furthermore, Ofsted are yet to publish their Curriculum Research Review of D&T - the only remaining National Curriculum subject where the review is not yet published.

– PISA framework. The OECD’s Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) framework informs education policy. It evaluates each country’s educational systems by measuring 15-year-old students’ performance on mathematics, science, and reading. In practice, it incentives policymakers to target high performance in these three areas (maths, science and reading) as it does not consistently value high performance in other ability areas. However, every year PISA tests an ‘innovative’ assesment area such as ‘Collaborative Problem Solving’ (2015) or ‘Creative Thinking’ (2022). In these cases, the skills assesed draw heavily on design, in other years like 2025’s ‘Learning in the Digital World’ or 2018’s ‘Global Competence’ less so. Disappointingly, in 2022 the UK chose to opt-out of the Creative Thinking assesment. If the PISA framework could be updated to permanently include a design-relevant assesment area like Creative Thinking in the core framework, policymakers and schools may be incentivised to invest in D&T.

– Squeezed school budgets. Real-term cuts to school funding since 201055 have squeezed school spending per pupil.56 Teachers often can’t afford the equipment needed to provide high-quality making and design experiences. In one instance, a product design teacher at a state school in Berkshire has experienced an annual department budget reduced from £3-4k to £790, which needs to cover 430 students.57

This is having a damaging effect on student learning experience. D&T’s handson making approach requires specialist equipment,spaces, health and safety accreditation, materials, and staff training which can be expensive to run.

In Northern Ireland D&T is formally part of the STEM curriculum. The subject is only seeing a slight decline but from a lower starting point. However, the creative richness of the curriculum offer is seen to be lacking, and creativity in the curriculum is not consistently championed.

In Wales there are recent, significant changes to secondary education with the Curriculum for Wales. D&T numbers are falling, but the process of designing is being mainstreamed with students using design approaches to join up learning between subject areas. There are 6 ‘areas of learning and experience’, with D&T falling into ‘science and technology’58 and art and design into ‘Expressive Arts’.

In Scotland, the subject is in decline, though at a slower rate. In addition to the factors shared with England above –principally curriculum quality, teacher recruitment, and fractured pathways to HE –the diversification of Level 3 qualifications, with 6 distinct D&T-related options, is fragmenting student choice.

The impact of the decline

With little or no published evidence for the causal link between taking GCSE or A Level D&T and an individual’s income, career, or educational progression, it is hard to truly understand the impact of declining D&T numbers. More research is needed.59

However there are early signs that the decline in D&T is:

– Impacting universities. Universities report a significant and growing gap between what they expect from first-year students and what A-Level students entering courses are able to do. In Kingston University, they have recently introduced ‘learning to learn’ courses for all undergraduates to bridge the gap. In Nottingham Trent University, they are noticing that hand drawing skills of new product design students are worsening. Anecdotally, academics believe this is connected to the reduction in students taking D&T, a subject where many key design skills in HE such as problem-based and self-guided learning or freehandsketching are, or used to be, taught well.

– Impacting industry - skills Design, craft, architecture, and engineering firms report significant skills shortages. Anecdotally, we hear that students are coming into first jobs with a lack of experience in handson making skills, perhaps to the decline in D&T and shift away from workshop-based making in the subject. Industrial design firm PriestmanGoode describes exposure to creativity and creative problem-solving at school as being essential for the interns they work with, along with physical making ability - while much of their design work is done digitally, creating large-scale physical

models is still essential to their practice, and something interns increasingly struggle with. This requires further research.

– Impacting industry - diversity. Industry leaders report finding it “harder and harder to recruit the diversity of talent we need”.60 The industry-led Creative Industries Alliance notes an “ever-increasing proportion of applicants from fee-paying school backgrounds where it is possible to study and gain qualifications in subjects like art, craft and design, and fewer from state school backgrounds where these subjects are increasingly rare. This restricts not only the potential talent pool but also the diversity of design teams. An industry like ours depends on diversity of background, perspective, and ideas.”61

Further research is needed to quantify the impact of declining D&T and to understand how it has impacted other parts of the education system.

Recommendations

“We have reached a critical time in design education. [...]. D&T is a uniquely interdisciplinary subject encouraging practical problem solving, collaboration, empathy, and creativity, as well as both critical and analytical thinking. Most importantly, it inspires young people to be curious, to trust their own ideas, and equips them to explore solutions to the world’s biggest problems.”

Sir Jonny Ive KBE HonFREng RDI62

As policymakers work towards setting future education policy agendas, there is a tangible opportunity to reimagine the role of design in the curriculum and create a relevant, modern subject that develops students’ problem solving, creativity, systems thinking and making abilities by applying them to real-world problems. There is a chance to nurture and grow a workforce of innovative D&T teachers and create facilities fit for today and tomorrow’s responsible and planet-centric design practices.

A diverse set of solutions have been developed by the sector, and it’s clear that there is no single silver bullet. Change is needed on two fronts:

– In the short term, to stem the flow of teachers and students leaving the subject and ensure D&T does not fall into the margins of the curriculum risking its future as a core curriculum subject.

– Over the medium term, to forge an ambitious, forward-looking future for design as the jewel in the crown of a reimagined British education system - a core competency that develops creative problem-solving, technical knowledge, material intelligence, critical thinking and making ability, focused on the needs of our future economy and society. This may mean D&T and the wider curriculum look quite different than they do today.

We recommend that the policymakers prioritise working with industry and education leaders on four actions over the next parliamentary term:

Refine and renew the D&T curriculum for 11-18-year-olds, aligning it to inclusive innovation and sustainability.

Despite examples of excellent practice across the UK, D&T has struggled to find its place as a modern, high-value subject in most schools. Its purpose in the curriculum has also changed over time as new art, craft and design specialisms and vocational routes have been added. Leaders across the sector have worked collaboratively to create visions for the subject and propose amendments to the subject curriculum – but this has not been centrally convened by the government, so has yet to make a national-scale impact. Policymakers should therefore work with industry to:

– Publish the D&T Ofsted Curriculum Research Review (OCRR). This This is the only remaining unpublished review of all National Curriculum subjects. When published, this will be the most comprehensive contemporary publication of D&T’s epistemology and an important foundation of subject renewal. The government should ask Ofsted to expedite the OCRR’s publication.

– Convene a cross-sector taskforce to review all design education pathways, taking into account D&T, engineering, art, craft and design, and the four new design-related T-Levels. Building on existing work,63 the review should create and implement a plan to evolve D&T so that it truly equips students to address global challenges such as climate change and AI, as well as meet HE, FE, and industry needs. This could be co-convened by DCMS and DfE.

– Map opportunities for mainstreaming responsible, sustainable and regenerative design into the curriculum, ensuring D&T is seen as being relevant to students’ priorities and futures, bringing design practice in D&T closer to experience in industry. This should build on existing work.64

– Focus on improving the KS3 experience: Consultation with teachers suggests that the most fundamental curriculum reform is needed at KS3 to shift from learning being task-output-oriented to being designprocess led.65

– Review examined content at GCSE. Exploring the content and structure of the reformed GCSE specification afresh. The review should consider the balance of breadth and depth in specification content, ways to reduce teacher workload, the potential unintended consequences of the increased (50%) written assesment, and potential value of the 15% examined maths requirement in the curriculum. This should be considered within a holistic curriculum review.

– Ensure alignment with wider creative industries needs. Approximately 25% of people working in the creative industries have design roles66 - from VFX designers in the screen sector to graphic designers in publishing. A curriculum review should ensure D&T supports all creative industries’ talent pipelines. For instance, exploring how the games industry’s trade association UKIE’s proposal for a Digital Creativity GCSE could be met through a renewed D&T GCSE; and ensuring the hand skills and material intelligence vital for crafts industries are nurtured through D&T as they are in the existing art and design specifications. While creative industries skills shortage data

is limited and fragmented, there is a general sense that many of the biggest skills gaps in the creative economy could be taught through D&T courses.67

– Review the role of Food and Nutrition in the D&T subject suite, exploring if it should be moved into its own curriculum space. There are current consultations on a seperate, sequenced qualification route for Food and Nutrition extending up to KS5, as a direct pathway into HE and industry.68

– Explore a purposeful ‘re-founding’ of the subject on refreshed design principles, potentially accompanied by a subject ‘rebrand’. Existing proposals include ‘Engineering, Design & Technology’ (proposed by the IET), ‘Design, Engineering and Innovation’ (proposed by the Design and Technology Association), and ‘Responsible Design and Innovation’ (proposed by Pearson). This shift could

help challenge negative subject perceptions and reboot the subject nationally.

– Identify and celebrate D&T role models for teachers and parents, inspiring them to encourage their children and students to explore D&T. This could be part of the Discover Creative Careers campaign but would need additional investment. The campaign could be linked to thematic priorities, such as AI or climate change, to demonstrate the relevance of the subject and making the link to innovation clear.

The review has two possible outcomes: either incremental improvement to the current curriculum and exam boards’ specifications without changing the qualification standard or Assesment Objectives (AOs). Alternatively, more extensive reform, refreshing the AOs and subject structure to better align with HE and industry priorities and teaching capabilities.

Develop and implement a funded strategy for D&T teacher recruitment, training, CPD and retention.

Quality teaching will be the foundation for more students choosing to study the subject. Missed Post-Graduate Initial Teacher Training (PGITT) recruitment targets means millions earmarked for D&T teacher training bursaries goes unspent every year.

In 2022/23, only 25% of the targeted 1,825 £15,000 bursaries were taken up, leaving £20,625,000 unspent. In 2023/24, the target has risen to 2,110 with a bursary of £20,000; if only 25% are taken up again, £31,650,000 will be unspent. Positively, the D&T ITT bursary will rise to £25,000 in 24/25 which should boost recruitment.

The discrepancy between art, craft and design and D&T training bursaries may simply be pulling teachers who intend to teach art, craft and design to train in D&T, not serving to strengthen the workforce for either subject well. What’s more, some D&T teacher training still differentiates the subject into “textiles” and “electronics” which is out of step with the current single-subject curriculum.

The government must now work with the sector to reinvest this unspent money in a package of tangible interventions to support the teaching profession. Bursaries alone are insufficient and must be coupled with subject reform, classroom and CPD funding, and an elevated status for D&T in the curriculum and assessment frameworks.

In the short term, this will stabilise the teaching workforce and upskill D&T teachers so they can offer an excellent education which ‘pulls’ students into the subject. In the longer term, a strong teaching profession will be the foundation for subject renewal, with teachers redesigning the subject and their curricula.69

Options include:

– Provide high-quality ITT and consistent, competitive, training bursaries. Positively, Positively, in October 2023, the government announced the PGITT bursary for D&T would be uprated from £20,000 to £25,000, on par with biology but still below the current £28,00 for computing, maths, chemistry, and physics, despite equivalent shortages.70 Art, craft and design trainee teachers’ £10,000 bursary has been reinstated this year.71 Ongoing consistency is key. The inconsistent approach to date has not only failed to stabilise recruitment but also created a harmful hierarchy of subjects that is having a widespread and damaging impact on teacher recruitment and retention.

– Explore setting up a scholarship route for PGITT, mirroring the existing schemes for physics, chemistry, maths and computing which work with a professional institution to provide an uplifted bursary, and ongoing mentoring and networking.

– Increase CPD funding for all D&T and art, craft and design teachers, supporting both specialist and non-specialist teachers to develop dynamic curricular, upskill on new technology and sustainability knowledge, and stay in the profession longer. Design teachers should have access to ringfenced CPD budgets and time.

– Invest in a design equivalent to the Stimulating Physics Network, which has successfully used CPD, mentoring and coaching to boost both teacher retention and student numbers for 60 lead schools’ physics departments at a cost to the Department for Education of £2.7 million. This support could be targeted at Early Career Teachers (ECTs) who leave the subject at a higher level in

their first 5 years. Supporting these teachers to stay in the profession and spearhead the renewal of the subject is vital.

– Extend the Levelling Up Premium payments to D&T teachers, who are currently excluded from the scheme72 despite similar shortage rates to chemistry, languages, mathematics, and physics teachers in deprived areas.

– Roll out a professional recruitment scheme for designers and engineers to teach D&T. Policymakers could explore and evaluate existing models to base this on, such as the government-funded “Engineers Teach Physics”.

– Pilot teacher budgets for industry and community collaborative teaching, enabling teachers to become curators of knowledge, and bring practicing designers and engineers into the classroom to teach specialist topics.

– Support teachers from all subjects to access sector-led initiatives that enrich and pioneer new approaches to design-

led learning, from V&A’s Innovate to build challenges run by MATT+FIONA or industrybacked learning resources such as the D&T Associations ‘Inspired by Industry’, IET’s FIRST® LEGO® League, RIBA’s ‘Skill Up’, London School of Architecture’ Part 0, or Forth’s Fixperts. D&T will take several years to recover, so access to these initiatives is vital to enable more students to experience a great design education, within or outside of D&T. The government should work with the sector to coordinate these initiatives, for example, piloting regional design exchange hubs, built in the model of Music Hubs. This support could be set out in the Cultural Education Plan

Ensuring a thriving teaching body is the foundation for subject renewal. If a new curriculum is to be introduced, it must be created with teachers and develop their agency, rather than being implemented from the top down, potentially piling on extra workload and pressure. Improving the confidence and ability of teachers also means they can design better curricula today, based on the current subject content.

Consider D&T in any reform of reform school accountability, performance and inspection measures

Policymakers should consider how they can change the structural enablers of better design education:

– Prioritise changes that support the revival of D&T in any reform to EBacc and Progress 8 accountability measures. The House of Lords 11-16 Education Committee’s report has highlighted the damaging impact of the EBacc and calls for it to be withdrawn.73 When assesing potential alternatives, such as shifting to ‘Progress 5’,74 policymakers should prioritise interventions that widen student choice and enable schools to more evenly distribute resources to creative subjects like D&T.

– Ensure Ofsted are rewarding excellent D&T teaching at secondary schools

appropriately. The Department for Education should work with Ofsted to ensure secondary school inspection criteria are properly incentivising schools to teach a broad and balanced curriculum, recognising and celebrating the importance of excellence in D&T teaching.75

– Agree a permanent creative addition to the PISA framework. The government should also work with other OECD member countries and the PISA governing body to agree a permanent addition to the PISA framework which assesses pupil performance in creative thinking and problem solving, ensuring that British student excellence in design capabilities is valued at the highest level. In the interim, the UK should commit to entering students into all creative PISA assessments, correcting the error of opting-out of the 2022 Creative Thinking test.

Put design at the heart of a reformed, broad, balanced and creative curriculum.

All children should be able to benefit from a worldclass design education, developing valuable material intelligence, applied creativity, problemsolving, and systems thinking abilities. However currently design suffers from exclusive delivery as a subject when many of the concepts and skills it develops are cross-curricular and cross-disciplinary in nature.76 Designing brings other subjects alive through applying a creative, hands-on, problemsolving approach to real-world challenges.

As part of a holistic curriculum and assessment review, policymakers should put creativity at the heart of a reimagined learning experience for students:

– Develop design as a foundational skill woven into all subjects. Like oracy, design is a ‘skill for life’ and needs to be practiced across multiple subject areas. Examples of this in practice include Daydream Believers’ Creative Thinking qualification offered in schools across Scotland; Fixperts by Forth that uses open schooling methods to enable students to solve real challenges for real people using design; and Crafts Council’s ‘Make First’ pedagogy uses materials to develop and test ideas.All these approaches demonstrate creativity with context and purpose –enabling students to use design to bring alive multiple subject areas, build relationships, and develop new skills and knowledge. Policymakers should explore how these approaches can be mainstreamed in England’s schools.

– Pilot and evaluate a range of additional, cross-curricular design-based educational approaches. Building on existing best practice, the government should work with industry and the sector to fund and evaluate a series of pilots. For instance, a module on design thinking within the physics curriculum; or a design-led, cross-curricular challenge students solve each term, in collaboration with a local business or community organisation. These should supplement and not replace specialised design education pathways like D&T.

– Complement a core of design skills with specialist design and technology routes. More incremental changes could be made through exploring design’s role as a ‘minor’ subject (for instance, a ‘design thinking’ minor) as well as a D&T equivalent ‘major’ in the proposed Advanced British Standard. It would be beneficial to formalise a core of design skills and knowledge from a diverse and epistemologically inconsistent set of design A-Levels and T-Levels. This could involve creating a consistent and innovative design ‘core’ to all four design T-Levels, or re-imagining the subject categories more holistically.

The purpose of this approach would be to enable all children to access the best design education This type of design - focused on creative problem-solving and material intelligence over set outputs - is highly relevant to modern design practice equipping students to address complex global challenges and drive the green transition. Implementing this fully would require a fundamental shift in England’s educational policy approach.

Supporting actions

Beyond the recommendations above, the HE sector, research funders, and industry should work together to:

– Review university entry requirements, examining how HE institutions can encourage more students to take D&T, and whether D&T students are disadvantaged during application because of the perception that they have a task-oriented approach. Explore options for contextual recruitment to strengthen D&T’s standing.

– Fund research to address evidence gaps on the value of D&T. There are many significant evidence gaps around design education. Research should be comissioned to helpo establish an ROI for the subject and develop the evidence base on best practice. This could include a longitudinal study about the impact of studying design on the future careers of students; or an equivalent to UCL’s ASPIRES research project on science career aspirations and subject choices. Research should aim to support developing teaching practice in schools.

Conclusion and next steps

The Design Council will continue to work with partners across design education, engineering, creative industries, and schools to advocate for the future of design education, and engagement with technology, creativity and designing in schools.

We strive to work with the incoming government, DfE, DCMS, and the Creative Industries Council to prioritise areas for action and develop government support for change.

Annex A Contributors

This briefing has been informed by and developed with a wider group of contributors over a year. This includes:

– Alison Hardy, Associate Professor, Nottingham Trent University

– Alistair Payne, Head of the School of Arts, Kingston University

– Alexandra-Deschamps Sonsino, former Chief Design Officer, Design Council

– Ann de Caires, Team Administrator, Policy and Research, Edge Foundation

– Anthea Hollist, Head of Qualifications and Assessment, UAL Awarding Body

– Beatrice Barleon, Head of Public Affairs and Policy, EngineeringUK

– Bethan Gordon, Acting Dean, Cardiff School of Art & Design

– Bernard Hay, Former Head of Knowledge, Design Council

– Cat Drew, Chief Design Officer, Design Council

– Daniel Charny, Director, Forth and Professor of Design, Kingston University.

– David Houston, Schools and Colleges Team Leader, V&A

– Dave Parry, D&T Adviser, CLEAPSS

– Dawn Foxall, Founder, Textiles Skills Centre

– Debbie Johnson, Head of Skills, Innovate UK

– Deborah Dawton, CEO, Design Business Association

– Elizabeth Bull, Subject Advisor Engineering with D&T, OCR

– Elizabeth Diaferia, British Fashion Council

– George Pope, Strategic Development Manager, MATT+FIONA

– Fiona MacDonald, Co-Founder and Director, MATT+FIONA

– Gail Caig, Creative Industries Council

– Holly Burton, National Schools Programme Producer, V&A

– Julia Fenby, Education Officer, Creativity, Education Scotland

– Kat Emms, Education and Policy Senior Researcher, Edge Foundation

– Katie Ingrey, Education Policy Manager, Institution of Engineering & Technology

– Kirsty Dias, Director, PriestmanGoode

– Kirsty McFaul, Design and Technology lead, Education Scotland

– Louise Atwood, Head of Design and Technology, AQA

– Matilda Agace, Senior Policy and Advocacy Manager, Design Council

– Matthew Sinclair, Associate Professor, Edinburgh Napier University

– Matthew Springett, Co-Founder and Director, MATT+FIONA

– Michael Noone, Head of Design/Engineering,

The Queen Elizabeth School Barnet

– Michele Gregson, Chief Executive/ General Secretary, NSEAD

– Minnie Moll, Chief Executive, Design Council

– Nicky Dewar, Learning & Skills Director, Crafts Council

– Phil Holton, Senior Strategy Manager, Pearson

– Rachel Gannon, Head of School of Design, Kingston University

– Ruben Hale, Deputy Director, UAL Awarding Body

– Sandra Booth, Director of Policy and External Relations, CHEAD

– Sarah Davies, Senior Lecturer, Nottingham Trent University

– Shahneila Saeed, Head of Education, UKIE

– Sir Peter Bazalgette, Chair, Creative Industries Council

– Stephen Page, Chair, CIC Skills and Education group

– Tony Ryan, Chief Executive, Design and Technology Association

We would also like to thank the policy teams at Department for Education and Department for Culture, Media and Sport for their involvement and guidance throughout this work.

“Our world is changing at such a speed that we, and the rich biodiversity of our planet are struggling to adapt. Yet the solutions to so many of the world’s challenges exist, it is simply a question of making them happen. To do this we need great minds, to imagine, design and create tomorrow’s solutions to today’s problems. […] We are born makers and must nurture and value design and technology as a core tenant of our education system, if we want to live in harmony with planet earth.”

Will Butler-Adams OBE, Chief Executive Officer at Brompton Bicycle

Endnotes

1 World Economic Forum (2023), Future of Jobs: These are the most in-demand core skills in 2023 (weforum. org)

2 Design Council (2018), Designing a Future Economy: Developing Design Skills for Innovation and Productivity (designcouncil.org.uk)

3 Design Council (2022), Design Economy: People, Places and Economic Value, (designcouncil.org.uk)

4 Department for Culture, Media and Sport (2023), Creative Industries Sector Vision (gov.uk)

5 House of Lords, Communications and Digital Committee (2023), At Risk: Our Creative Future (parliament.uk)

6 House of Lords, Education for 11–16 Year Olds Committee (2023), Requires Improvement: Urgent Change for 11–16 Education (parliament.uk)

7 There has been extensive sector-led work on the future of the subject and evolving the curriculum from the Design and Technology Association, AQA, OCR. Pearson Edexcel, Forth Together, and many academics and educators.

8 In 2022/23 the government set a target of 1825 new ITT D&T entrants, but only 450 were recruited, leaving 1375 budgeted places unfilled. With each place funded for £15,000 this leaves £20,625,000 unspent in 2022/23. Department for Education (2023), ITT new entrants, recruitment targets and trainee characteristics by subject' from 'Initial Teacher Training Census’ (explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk)

9 This is a consistent request across engineering and creative sectors, with the Save Our Subjects campaign championing change, and Lord Knight and Lord Willetts’ Fit for The Future inquiry into apprenticeships

10 Fixperts (2019), Talking about a revolution (fixperts.org)

11 Design Council (2022), Design Economy: People, Places and Economic Value (designcouncil.org.uk)

12 Ofqual (2023), GCSE outcomes in England (ofqual. gov.uk)

13 Ofqual (2023), A Level outcomes in England (ofqual. gov.uk)

14 Pearson (2023), Pearson and the Future of Design Education (pearson.com)

15 Education Policy Institute (2022), A Spotlight on Design and Technology study in England (epi.org.uk)

16 Campaign for the Arts (2023), Huge decline in arts subjects worsens at GCSE and A-level (campaignforthearts.org)

17 Education Policy Institute (2022), A Spotlight on Design and Technology study in England (epi.org.uk)

18 Design and Technology Association (2023), GCSE Results Day 2023 (designtechnology.org.uk)

19 National Society for Education in Art and Design (2023), Examinations 2023 (nsead.org)

20 Education Policy Institute (2022), A Spotlight on Design and Technology study in England (epi.org.uk)

21 Pearson (2023), Pearson and the Future of Design Education (pearson.com)

22 Schools Week (2023), Extent of classes taught by nonspecialist teachers revealed (schoolsweek.co.uk)

23 It is worth noting that trainee Art and Design teachers are also missing targets, recruiting 90% of the target in 22/23, (explore-education-statistics.service.gov.uk)

24 National Society for Education in Art and Design (2023), A recruitment and retention crisis in Art and Design (nsead.org)

25 Education Policy Institute (2022), A Spotlight on Design and Technology study in England (epi.org.uk)

26 Department for Education (2013), Design and technology programmes of study: key stages 1 and 2 (gov.uk)

27 Ofsted (2023), Research review series: art and design (gov.uk)

28 Kingston University (2023), Future Skills: The Kingston Approach (kingston.ac.uk)

29 World Economic Forum (2023), Future of Jobs: These are the most in-demand core skills in 2023 (weforum. org)

30 Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (2023), Future-facing Innovation Strategy (instituteforapprenticeships.org)

31 LinkedIn Economic Graph (2022), Global Green Skills Report 2022 (linkedin.com)

32 Design Council (2018), Designing a Future Economy: Developing Design Skills for Innovation and Productivity (designcouncil.org.uk)

33 Design Council (2022), Design Economy: People, Places and Economic Value, (designcouncil.org.uk)

Endnotes

34 Definition adapted from Alexandra Deschamps-Sonsino for the Design Council

35 Nigel Cross (2001), Designerly Ways of Knowing: Design Discipline versus Design Science, Design Issue (jstor.org)

36 Design Council (2022), Design Economy: People, Places and Economic Value, (designcouncil.org.uk)

37 Nigel Cross (2001), Designerly Ways of Knowing: Design Discipline versus Design Science, Design Issue (jstor.org)

38 Design Council (2022), Design Economy: People, Places and Economic Value, (designcouncil.org.uk)

39 Prajapat, B., Sinclair, R. and Hardy, A. (2022), How do we do race in design and technology?, in: A. Hardy, ed., Debates in Design and Technology Education. 2nd ed. Routledge, 2022, pp. 45-61.

40 Education Policy Institute (2022), A Spotlight on Design and Technology study in England (epi.org.uk)

41 House of Commons Library (2023), Teacher recruitment and retention in England (parliament.uk)

42 University of Bristol (2022), Pioneering study reveals teaching techniques which boost exam performance (bristol.ac.uk)

43 National Foundation for Educational Research (2006), How Do Young People Make Choices at 14 and 16? (dera.ioe.ac.uk)

44 Textiles Skills Centre (2024), Unravelling the Fabric Of Textiles Education (textilesskillscentre.com)

45 Education Policy Institute (2022), A Spotlight on Design and Technology study in England (epi.org.uk)

46 Many organisations have reported similar findings from teachers around the risk of the ‘making things’ approach. Including the Design and Technology Association, Reimagining D&T (genial.ly); and Pearson, The Future of Design Education and Curriculum (pearson.com)

47 Ofqual (2023), GCSE outcomes in England (ofqual.gov. uk)

48 Design Council (2024), The Green Design Skills Gap (designcouncil.org.uk)

49 Design Council (2022), Design Economy: People, Places and Economic Value, (designcouncil.org.uk)

50 The EBacc consists of: english language and literature;

maths; the sciences; geography or history; a language.

51 Edge Foundation (2022), The narrow curriculum in state schools is levelling down creative opportunities for young people (edge.co.uk); https://www. saveoursubjects.org/

52 For example, while Business studies is not in the EBacc student numbers have grown significantly over recent years. Modern Foreign languages were moved into the EBacc but this did not boost student numbers to the target level.

53 Department for Education (2021), Teaching a broad and balanced curriculum for education recovery (gov. uk)

54 Design and Technology Association (2023), Reimagining D&T: D&T Association’s ‘Vision’ for the future of the subject in English Schools (designtechnology.org.uk)

55 The Institute for Fiscal Studies (2021), School spending in England: trends over time and future outlook (ifs.org. uk)

56 The Institute for Fiscal Studies (2024), Education Spending: Schools (ifs.org.uk)

57 Phil Hall (2023), Post on LinkedIn (linkedin.com)

58 Education Wales (2022), Curriculum for Wales: Area of Learning and Experience, Science and Technology (hwb.gov.wales)

59 Analysis of existing evidence base by Dr. Alison Hardy, Nottingham Trent University

60 Creative Industry Alliance (2023), #MakeCreativityMatter (creativeindustryalliance.co.uk)

61 Creative Industry Alliance (2023), #MakeCreativityMatter (creativeindustryalliance.co.uk)

62 Design and Technology Association (2023), Reimagining D&T: D&T Association’s ‘Vision’ for the future of the subject in English Schools (designtechnology.org.uk)

63 There has been extensive sector-led work on the future of the subject and evolving the curriculum from the Design and Technology Association, Forth Together, exam boards and many academics and educators.

64 For example, this should consider Pearson’s review of regenerative and responsible design in the D&T curriculum (pearson.com)

Endnotes

65 Design and Technology Association (2023), Reimagining D&T: D&T Association’s ‘Vision’ for the future of the subject in English Schools (designtechnology.org.uk)

66 Design Council (2022), Design Economy: Data table, tab 38 (designcouncil.org.uk)

67 House of Lords, Communications and Digital Committee (2023), At Risk: Our Creative Future (parliament.uk)

68 The Food Teachers Centre (2023), Food Education: Fit for the future? (foodteacherscentre.co.uk)

69 Learning from the approach of Wales’ teacher-led curriculum design. Education Wales (2022) Developing a vision for curriculum design (hwb.gov.wales)

70 Department for Education (2023), Funding: initial teacher training (ITT), academic year 2024 to 2025 (gov.uk)

71 National Society for Education in Art and Design (2023), The DfE have listened and are reinstating ITT art and design bursaries (nsead.org)

72 Department for Education (2024), Early-career payments for teachers (gov.uk)

73 House of Lords, Education for 11–16 Year Olds Committee (2023), Requires Improvement: Urgent Change for 11–16 Education (parliament.uk)

74 Edge Foundation (2024), Curriculum and AssessmentBroad, Innovative, Multimodal (edge.co.uk)

75 House of Lords, Education for 11–16 Year Olds Committee (2023), Requires Improvement: Urgent Change for 11–16 Education (parliament.uk)

76 Fixperts (2019), Talking about a revolution (fixperts.org)

About Design Council

Design Council has been the UK’s national strategic advisor on design for over 75 years.

We are an independent not-for-profit organisation that champions design and its ability to make life better for all. Our Design for Planet mission aims to accelerate the critical role design must play to address the climate crisis.

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