3 in 5 parents in England have still not heard of #TLevels

With only one year to go until the first T Levels are rolled out in England, a survey of parents of 11-18 year olds commissioned by CMI shows that around 3 in 5 parents (57%) have still not heard of T Levels and only 1 in 10 (11%) feel they know a lot about them.

This lack of awareness is greater among those from lower socioeconomic groups, where 84% of parents had never heard of T Levels.

Once explained, many parents are optimistic about the potential of T Levels. 71% think T Levels will help prepare young people with the skills needed for the workforce, 58% think they will be better than existing vocational programmes and 53% think they will have the same status and value as A Levels.

Rob Wall, Head of Policy at CMI said:

“Raising awareness of T Levels with parents is proving to be a real challenge. As parents are a major influencer in young people’s education and career choices, educating and informing parents will be key to making T Levels a success.

“At CMI, we know that high quality technical and vocational education increases employability and boosts social mobility and the Government’s recent announcement to invest additional funding in T Levels is to be welcomed. But students cannot enjoy these benefits if they are not aware of or not encouraged to consider non-academic pathways. 

“The fact that over 4 in 5 parents from lower income households have still not heard of T Levels should be a huge wake up call for Ministers and policy makers alike.”   

CMI commissioned Opinium to run an online survey of parents of children aged 11-18 in England, between 5th August and 9th August 2019. A sample of 824 parents, representative of the English population, completed the survey.