Collection

Reducing school workload

Support and practical resources for schools to help reduce workload, including the school workload reduction toolkit.

School workload reduction toolkit

Practical resources for school leaders and teachers to help reduce workload, produced by school leaders, teachers and other sector experts together with the Department for Education (DfE).

Tips from school leaders

This advice provides tips and links to case studies and resources for managing change and reducing workload, including the effective use of technology.

Supporting trainee teachers

Principles, considerations and examples of practical support to help initial teacher education (ITE) providers reduce the workload faced by trainee teachers and their school partners.

Supporting early career teachers

Advice for school leaders and staff who support teachers in the early stages of their career to help reduce their workload.

What has worked in schools

Examples of how education professionals reduced workload in their schools.

Reducing workload in your school

You can also find out how education professionals reduced workload in their schools on the DfE teaching blog, or in DfE-sponsored articles on Tes.

Reports from independent groups

Reports from teacher workload review groups, offering advice on marking policy, planning and teaching resources, and data management.

Research and analysis

Research and analysis on reducing teacher workload. For results of the National Foundation for Education (NFER) teacher voice omnibus survey, the school snapshot survey and post-16 institutions omnibus survey, use Teacher, school and post-16 institutions surveys.

Department for Education policy

The following policy documents set out DfE’s commitments to reducing workload in schools, and clarify the role everyone in education has to play.

Working together on workload

Reducing workload in schools is also an important part of DfE’s teacher recruitment and retention strategy (published in January 2019).

Published 21 July 2018
Last updated 15 June 2023 + show all updates
  1. Updated the 'Research and analysis' section by adding links to: 'Working lives of teachers and leaders – wave 1', 'Exploring school collaboration and workload reduction' and 'Teacher, school and post-16 institution surveys'. Removed the school snapshot surveys for winter 2018 and summer 2018.

  2. Added 'Reducing teacher workload: Education Development Trust report'.

  3. Improved layout of page, including creating new sections, based on user needs, feedback and research.

  4. First published.