Correspondence

DfE Update further education: 26 November 2025

Published 26 November 2025

Applies to England

1. Information: R14 provisional qualification achievement rates for 2024 to 2025

Your provisional qualification achievement rates (QARs) have now been released on view your education data (VYED).

On reviewing this provisional data, you have until 5pm on Friday 30 January 2026 to inform us of any concerns about how we have implemented our published methodology.

It has not been possible to migrate the Campus identifier field into the new QAR VYED reports for this release, but this will be available in your R14 final reports. We apologise for any inconvenience this may cause. 

Please note that you cannot request fixes or adjustments to your 2023 to 2024 ILR data.

If you have any queries in relation to QARs, contact us using the customer help portal (select “data and MI” query). Further peer support can also be found on the help centre.

2. Information: Updates to the college financial planning handbook

We have made minor updates to the college financial planning handbook.

The first update follows our review of College Financial Forecasting Returns (CFFR) which has revealed some inconsistency in the way some colleges have been accounting for unspent capital grant funding.

Capital grant money received before meeting the grant conditions, must be shown, in the finance return, as restricted cash with a corresponding deferred income creditor. This helps keep things clear and consistent and when we are assessing the financial health of a college, we will treat that money as restricted.

This clarification should enable colleges to comply with section 17 of the further and higher education Statement of Recommended Practice.

The second update reflects the publication of new guidance on college oversight, improvement and intervention.

3. Information: Further education workforce and governor data collection – exceptional deadline extension

Thank you to the many providers who have already submitted their further education (FE) workforce and governor data collection return.

We have been made aware of challenges that some providers have faced with adapting IT systems to include National Insurance numbers as part of their workforce return.

For this reason, we are offering an exceptional and limited extension to the deadline. This applies to both the workforce and the governor returns.

Providers who haven’t yet submitted their return now have until 6pm on Wednesday 10 December 2025 to do so.

This collection is mandatory and there will be no further extension beyond this point.  

The FE workforce and governor data collection collects the latest information at both a national and regional level on the number and characteristics of staff and governors in FE providers in England.

This data is vital to inform the development of government policy and decisions on funding.

4. Reminder: 2026 to 2027 high needs place change process

This is a reminder that the high needs place change process for 2026 to 2027 academic year closes on Friday 5 December 2025.

Schools and colleges should contact their local authorities about their high needs places for the 2026 to 2027 academic year. If no change is requested, in most cases, your 2025 to 2026 academic year place numbers will be used to determine your funding allocation.

You can read the guidance on the high needs place change process, alongside the spring 2025 census data for high needs pupil numbers in special academies and free schools, and the place numbers for 2024 to 2025 and 2025 to 2026.

You can use these to inform your discussions about commissioning arrangements for the 2026 to 2027 academic year.