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College Staffing key points 2022-23

This report is an overview of staff employed in the college education sector in Scotland from 2014-15 to 2022-23. It provides sector summary data on headcount and teaching and non-teaching (support) staff data by full-time equivalent (FTE) staff.

The publication is split into two sections:

  • FTE is based on the number of full-time equivalent staff employed in the college sector. Contracted hours are used as the basis for calculating FTEs and a full-time member of staff employed for the year would equate to an FTE of 1.

  • Headcount is based on the number of staff employed in the college during the academic year. Each member of staff is counted once, regardless of the number of hours/contracts for which they are employed.

The key points from this report are:

Full-time equivalent

  • There were 10,957 FTE staff employed in colleges in 2022-23, a decrease of 120 (1.1%) from the previous year.

  • The nine-year trend from the 2014-15 starting position represents an increase of 1.5% (160).

  • 5,369 FTE (49.0%) were teaching staff and 5,589 FTE (51.0%) non-teaching staff.

  • Teaching staff decreased by 0.1% (3 FTE) between 2014-15 and 2022-23 while non-teaching staff showed an increase of 3.0% (163 FTE).

  • Full-time staff (7,531) decreased by 2.3% since 2014-15.

  • Part-time staff (3,426) increased by 11.0% since 2014-15.

Headcount

  • The staff headcount decreased by 174 (1.2%) to 14,147 from 2022-22 (14,321).

  • Females account for 61% of all staff headcount in 2022-23, 54% of teaching and 68% of non-teaching staff.

  • Of the 236 senior management roles in 2022-23 the proportion of females decreased by 2.4pp to 52.1%.

  • The 51 and over age group accounted for 46.8% of the overall staff in 2022-23, a 6.1pp increase from 2014-15.

  • Black and minority ethnic (BME) staff made up 2.6% (361) of all headcounts in 2022-23. The proportion of BME female teaching staff has decreased by 0.2pp in the past year to 2.2% in 2022-23. In contrast, the proportion of BME male teaching staff has increased by 0.1pp in the past year to 3.0.% in 2022-23.

  • Those with a declared disability made up 7.5% (1,059) of all headcounts in 2022-23.

  • The proportion of full-time permanent college teaching staff with a formally recognised teaching qualification increased by 1.9pp from 86.3% in 2021-22 to 88.2% in 2022-23.

  • College staff known nationality proportions were as follows: 93.9% UK, 4.1% EU, 2.0% Non-EU international.

Section 1: Full-time equivalent staffing data

The charts presented in the following section show different breakdowns of staff full-time equivalents (FTEs) by mode and occupation type.

Figure 1: Staff FTE by mode of employment 2014-15 to 2022-23

Figure 2: Staff FTE by occupation 2014-15 to 2022-23

Figure 3: Teaching Staff FTE by mode of employment 2014-15 to 2022-23

Section 2: Headcount staffing data

The following three charts show information about staff headcount by sex and age band.

Figure 4: Staff (teaching & non-teaching) headcount by sex 2014-15 to 2022-23