Funding for 16- to 18-year-olds and general further education has been cut much more sharply than for schools and other parts of the education system, according to a new analysis.
The Institute for Fiscal Studies (IFS) found adult education has been cut by 45% since 2009–10, mostly delivered through fewer adult learners taking qualifications at GCSE level or below.
The research found that funding per student in school sixth forms has fallen by 21% since its peak in 2010–11 and is now lower than at any point since at least 2002–03.
Total school spending per pupil has fallen by 8% between 2009–10 and 2017–18, mainly driven by a 55% cut to local authority spending on services and large cuts to sixth-form funding.
But funding per pupil provided to individual primary and secondary schools has been better protected and is about 4% below its recent historic high in 2015 but is more than 60% higher than in 2000–01.
Co-author of the report and research fellow at the IFS, Luke Sibieta, said: 'Spending per student in higher education has risen by nearly 60% since 1997, and spending per school pupil rose by more than 50% over the 2000s, though it has fallen by 8% since 2010 once you include cuts to local authority spend and school sixth forms.
'In this context, the almost complete lack of growth in spending on further education is all the more remarkable.'
