The second wave of T Levels has been announced by Education Secretary Damian Hinds in his speech at Battersea Power Station. Hinds confirmed that T Levels will be allocated UCAS tariff points for university applications, with “each programme carrying the same UCAS points as three A Levels”. The following qualifications are to be taught from 2021:

• Health
• Healthcare science
• Science
• Onsite construction
• Building services engineering
• Digital support and services
• Digital business services

Hinds said:

“As we roll T Levels out, we’re also reviewing the qualifications currently on offer…we don’t simply want to add 25 to the 10,000 plus that already exist…

There are going to be some tough decisions ahead as we think carefully about what we take away from the system as well as what we add – we’ll consult before deciding on the nature of qualifications needed.”

The government announced it was investing an extra £38 million in capital funding “to support the first T Level providers to invest in high quality equipment and facilities”, and the new programmes will eventually be backed by £500 million of funding when the qualifications are fully rolled out. The funding for the higher T Levels is expected to be detailed in the post-18 education review, which is expected to be concluded in early 2019. 

The first wave of T levels – which are level 3 technical study programmes – will be taught by 50 training providers from 2020, with the Department for Education (DfE) aiming to select an additional 50 – 75 providers for 2021. T Levels 4 and 5 will be introduced in 2022 so that they will be available to the first cohort of T Level students. The DfE has delayed full roll-out of T Levels until September 2023 in response to “concerns about the capacity of the system to respond to this pace of roll-out.”

A Tes investigation in February found that more than half of Russell Group universities were still undecided as to whether they would accept T Level students onto their courses, University College London said it did not plan to accept T level students "at present" and the vice chancellor of Oxford University said the institution would "wait and see" before making a decision.

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