Teacher Pay Is Rising 3.5% in September — but Schools Must Fund Part of It. What Does That Mean for Your Child?

The specific question or worry a parent is having: "My child's teachers are getting a pay rise, but I'm hearing schools have to pay for part of it. Will that mean cuts to my child's education?"The Department for Education confirmed on 1 July 2026 that teachers will receive a 3.5% pay rise from September 2026, followed by a further 3% in September 2027. Education Secretary Bridget Phillipson accepted the School Teachers' Review Body (STRB) recommendations in full. But schools have been told they must fund the first 1% of each award from existing budgets. That is the catch every parent needs to understand.

What has actually been announced

The government's long-awaited response to the school teachers' review body (STRB) report for 2026 confirms a rise of at least 3.5% from September 2026. The STRB is the independent panel that recommends teacher pay each year; the Education Secretary can accept, reject or modify what it suggests.

This time, it is a two-year settlement. Teachers are to be handed a 3 per cent pay rise next year, with schools responsible for funding the first 1 per cent in 2027-28, and the same principle applies to the 3.5% rise this September. The STRB recommended that from September 2026, teachers and leaders will receive a pay award of 3.5%, followed by a further 3% increase from September 2027. These recommendations have been accepted in full.

There is one small variation at the bottom of the scale. A 5% increase will be applied to the minimum of the unqualified teacher range (rest of England), which is aimed at making the profession more attractive to new entrants.

What "not fully funded" means in practice

This is the bit that matters for your child's school. Schools are not being handed a cheque that covers the whole pay bill.

The Department for Education said it will provide £700 million in additional funding to schools in 2026-27. An additional £1.1 billion will be provided in 2027-28. Schools must find the rest themselves.

Schools will be expected to fund around a third of teacher and support staff awards from existing budgets. In DfE language, this is called an "efficiency" — the polite word for spending less on something else in order to spend more on staff.

The independent Institute for Fiscal Studies has been blunt about the arithmetic. Combined with other expected growth in schools' costs, mainstream schools' costs will grow by about 4% per year in both 2026-27 and 2027-28. Grant funding covers most, but not all, of that. Something has to give.

Why headteachers are worried

Staff salaries are by far the largest cost in any school budget — typically around 70-80% of the total. A 1% gap between the pay rise and the funding to pay for it is not a rounding error; on a secondary school with a £5 million budget, it's tens of thousands of pounds.

Pepe Di'Iasio, the general secretary of the leaders' union ASCL, welcomed the pay awards and the "greater certainty" brought about by a two-year announcement. But he said it had been "undermined…by how late in the summer term" it has come. Heads have been asked to plan for a pay bill they only received confirmation of in July — for a rise that starts in September.

The unions had been pressing hard for full funding. The teacher pay rise for 2026-27 will not be fully funded, Tes can reveal – despite unions warning of industrial action unless the government covered the full cost.

Where the money is likely to come from

Every school's situation is different, but the levers headteachers usually pull when they need to save money are broadly the same:

• Not replacing staff who leave. A retiring teacher or a departing teaching assistant is the easiest saving to make because it avoids redundancy. Class sizes drift up as a result.
• Cutting support staff hours. Teaching assistants, learning mentors, cover supervisors and administrative staff are often the first to feel the squeeze because they are not protected by the STRB.
• Reducing the curriculum offer. Small A-level classes, minority-language options and some GCSE subjects with low take-up are vulnerable in secondary schools. In primaries, this can mean fewer specialist music, PE or MFL lessons.
• Trimming enrichment and trips. Peripatetic music tuition, sports fixtures, residential trips and after-school clubs cost real money to run.
• Delaying maintenance and IT replacement. The least visible cut, and often the first one made.

None of this is speculative doom-mongering. It is what schools did through the last funding squeeze in the mid-2010s, and heads have been telling their governors for months that they may need to do it again.

What this means for your child, honestly

For most children in most schools, the effect will be gradual rather than dramatic. Your child's teacher is not going to disappear in September. But over the year you may notice:

• A larger class, or a mixed-year class in primary that wasn't mixed before.
• A teaching assistant who used to be in the classroom four mornings a week now only two.
• A subject option at GCSE or A-level being withdrawn if numbers are small.
• Fewer trips, or trips that ask parents to pay more of the cost.
• SEND provision under strain. This is the area heads are most worried about, because top-up funding from local authorities has not kept pace with need. If your child has an EHCP (Education, Health and Care Plan) or is on SEN support, this is worth watching closely.

Reasonable questions to ask your school

Governors' meetings and parents' evenings are the right place for these. Head teachers would generally rather have an informed question than a rumour.

• What is the school's budget position for 2026-27, and does it balance? Every maintained school and academy publishes some version of this. A polite email to the school business manager is usually enough.
• Are any staffing changes planned for September? Ask specifically about teaching assistants and support staff, not just teachers.
• Is class size expected to change in my child's year group?
• Are any subjects at risk of being dropped or timetabled differently? Relevant if you have a child choosing GCSE or A-level options.
• How is SEND provision being protected? If your child has additional needs, this is the single most important question.
• What is happening to enrichment — music tuition, sport, trips, clubs?

You are entitled to ask. Governing bodies exist partly so that parents have a route to the answers.

Where private tutoring genuinely fits — and where it doesn't

If your child's school is coping and your child is progressing well, a pay-funding gap in Whitehall is not a reason to hire a tutor. Schools remain the primary place children learn, and most will absorb this pressure without visible harm.

Where tutoring does become a sensible option is when a specific gap opens up that the school can no longer fill: a subject dropped at A-level that your child needs for university, one-to-one support withdrawn from a child on SEN support, or a Year 11 who has lost their subject specialist mid-course. In those cases, targeted, short-term tutoring can bridge the gap while the school reorganises. It is a stopgap, not a replacement.

In short

The 3.5% pay rise is real, and teachers deserve it. So is the 1% funding gap, and it will be paid for from budgets that were already tight. The pupils most likely to feel it are those who rely most on the things schools trim first — support staff, small-group provision, and specialist subjects. Parents who want to stay ahead of it should ask their school specific questions this term, before the September budget lands, rather than waiting to see what changes in the corridor.