A to Z glossary
Explanations of the terms DfE commonly uses
Mission patches
Archive of patches created to celebrate milestones in the development of our different services.
Teacher services map
How the ‘becoming a teacher’ services relate to other services in the teaching journey
Find postgraduate teacher training
A service for candidates to find courses by location, provider or subject
- Alpha
- UCAS course examples
- UCAS teacher training (search)
- Private beta
- Folded courses research 8 June 2018
- Just the UCAS data
- Just the UCAS data – 25 July iteration
- Subjects, bursaries and SKE courses
- PGDE and further education courses
- What we launched – 2 October 2018
- Results on a map – Early design with tweaks
- Results on a map – Full screen
- Results on a map – Full screen iteration
- Results on a map – User research 18 October
- Results on a map – Text on labels
- Showing a map in the filters column
- Special educational needs (SEN) filter
- Static failover service
- Iterate course titles
- Maps for providers with many partner schools
- Choose how to apply
- SEND survey and updates
- Choose how to apply – Iteration and research
- Performance report - March 2019
- Financial incentives
- Performance report - May 2019
- An end of cycle notice
- Closing search for the end of cycle
- Find as of December 2019
- Updating Cookie policy and banner
- Make it easier to find university courses
- Universities as an area
- Course page workshop
- Placement schools in search results
- End of cycle notices for 2020
- Prompting for feedback
- Searching by location
- Searching by location (iteration)
- Standardising entry requirement content
- New ‘International students’ section
- Visa sponsorship filter
- Finding courses at the end of the 2021 cycle
- New subject flow
- Degree requirements filter
- Removing 2 filters
- Updating the ‘International candidates’ section
- Exploring selected filter tags
- Making the service more browseable
- Improving the content on the search results page and course page
- Enhancing the browsable Find concept prototype
- Adding an ‘Engineers teach physics’ filter to the results list
- Filterable Find postgraduate training courses (Find) concept
- find-updated-bursaries-and-scholarships
- Extending the browsable Find concept with provider details pages
- Adding guidance for international candidates if the course is a teaching apprenticeship
- Fixing the ‘Engineers teach physics’ content in the ‘Qualifications needed’ section
- find-error-pages
- Expanding abbreviations to improve accessibility
- Adding a submit button to the ‘sort by’ form to improve accessibility
- Updating the service to improve accessibility
- Adding and updating links to Get Into Teaching
- Including information about subject knowledge enhancement (SKE) courses
- Improving the HTML page titles on the course results page
- Adding information about relocation payments to course pages
- Sorting by course name in the search results
- Making school placements content more accurate and consistent
- Redesigning the content in the ‘International candidates’ section and improving visa information
- Adding content about Get Into Teaching events
- Updating ‘Entry requirements’ content in line with policy
- Changing ‘locations’ to ‘schools’ in the school placements section
- find-renaming-accredited-body-to-accredited-provider
- Including a link to the Get Into Teaching bursaries and scholarships page
- Removing school placement vacancies
- Improving the content above school placements and in the provider search
Apply for teacher training
A service for candidates to submit an application to their chosen teacher training courses
- Apply – April 2018
- Apply – May 2018
- Apply – August 2018
- Apply – December 2018
- UCAS Teacher Training
- Free form application and qualifications
- Progressive application
- Prototyping with paper-based application forms
- Creating our first interactive prototype
- Apply – June 2019
- Sign up and log in using a magic link
- Picking courses to apply to
- Submitted application
- Work history - August iteration
- Equality monitoring
- Removing the teaching profile
- Cover letters
- Asking for an undergraduate degree
- Apply – September 2019
- From Find to Apply
- Amending and withdrawing
- Apply as launched on 26 November 2019
- Give a teacher training reference
- Giving details about disability
- Accessibility audit report from DAC
- What we ask for and why
- Give a teacher training reference (iteration)
- Working patterns for part time jobs
- Suitability to work with children
- Work history and volunteering guidance
- User research with first Apply candidates
- Interview needs
- Gather feedback from referees
- Replace a referee
- Replace both referees
- International address
- International qualifications
- Residency status
- Giving details about disability (iteration)
- Asking candidates to nominate referees
- Declaring any safeguarding issues
- Signing back into the service
- Add another course
- Choosing which service to apply through
- Stop applications to full or unavailable courses
- Work history breaks
- Give a reference (second iteration)
- Courses that become full after submission
- The summary card component
- Adding academic and other relevant qualifications
- Application dashboard
- Applying again (Apply 2)
- The troubles with amending (or editing) your application
- What needs to change if you’re applying again
- Informing candidates about the impact of coronavirus (COVID-19)
- Capturing feedback about the service
- Structured data for degree qualifications
- Applying again (iteration)
- Reason for withdrawing
- Improving the references user journey
- Apply again: Choose a course first
- Apply again: Accept or decline an offer and withdrawing
- Making the references process faster
- Structured data for pre-degree qualifications
- Courses that become full after submission – our initial approach
- Opening up the service to international candidates
- Is your English good enough to be a teacher?
- Asking for nationality
- Making the recruitment process transparent at the end of the year
- Asking for degree grades
- Helping candidates work on an application across 2 recruitment cycles
- Getting references before submitting an application
- Prompting for feedback throughout the application journey
- Simplifying the feedback form
- Improving work history
- Changing “Conditions met”
- Encouraging candidates to add A levels
- Dashboard changes
- Apply again changes
- Prompting candidates to review their answers before submitting
- Selecting references
- Allowing candidates to apply again earlier
- End of cycle 2021
- Changes to the GCSE questions and guidance
- Moving the personal details section to the top
- Updating the 'Choose your courses' flow for the new cycle
- Content improvements for international candidates
- Degree grade requirement warning message
- Updating the referee flow
- Apply again to 3 courses
- Simplifying the sign up page
- Changing the order of the initial degree questions
- Degree autocomplete changes
- Supporting foundation degrees
- Showing fee and salary information in offer details
- Helping providers assess a candidate’s fee status
- Improving the email sent to candidates about new interviews
- Updating the emails sent when users create an account or sign in
- Requesting references after offers have been accepted
- Asking candidates for reference details when they apply
- Asking candidates to confirm who reference requests should be sent to
- Letting candidates deal with reference requests after accepting an offer
- Changing how we ask people for a reference
- Changing how we ask about disabilities and health conditions
- Asking candidates if they received free school meals
- Asking if rejection feedback is helpful
- Telling candidates they need to do a subject knowledge enhancement course
- Merging the personal statement
- Changing how we ask candidates why they withdrew an application
Publish teacher training courses
A service for training providers to publish and manage their courses
- Experimental new course wizard
- Course with parts
- Original onboarding
- Courses and tabs
- What is a course?
- Course with variants and field guidance
- Course folding and UCAS course details
- Sign-in: Invite a user
- Sign-in: User registers themself
- Contextual guidance on course fields
- Show details from UCAS
- A university’s view
- School direct view
- School direct view – Iteration
- Draft of the QA process
- Draft of a read only version
- Iteration 26 June 2018
- Check your UCAS data (Initial launch)
- Iteration 28 June 2018
- Request access
- Managing multiple organisations
- Shared organisation details
- Templates
- When a user is not recognised
- Salary and fees
- UCAS course status
- Validating on publish
- Story map – 1 August 2018
- Course statuses – 3 August iteration
- Success messaging
- No more course folding
- Formatting
- Copy content from another course
- Fields we ask for and why
- Terms agreement
- Preview course
- Who did what and when
- User research – 22 August
- Iteration – 23 August
- Iteration – 24 August
- Contact details
- Enrichment release – 6 September
- Welcome email
- Copy content from another course (Live)
- Copy content – 14 September iteration
- Course statuses – 15 October iteration
- Edit a course outcome
- Hide discontinued training locations
- The location problem
- Location labels and survey research
- Schools autocomplete
- UCAS onboarding form
- New course wizard
- New course wizard – 6 December iteration
- New course wizard – Training locations
- Specific course requirements for UCAS Apply
- New course wizard – Minimum course requirements
- New course wizard – Confirming course title
- Rethinking the publish workflow
- Vacancies
- Migrating publish statuses
- Course page – 11 January iteration
- New course wizard – 14 January iteration
- Vacancies – 14 January iteration
- New course wizard – Further education
- Edit course information workflow
- Preparing for more features
- Add training location wizard
- Add a region or area workflow
- Minimum viable Add training location
- New course wizard: Accredited body – 5 February iteration
- New course wizard: Languages – 5 February iteration
- Status logic before UCAS transition
- Rollover reckons
- Add a location – 13 February iteration
- Email announcing UCAS transition
- Rollover wizard
- Onboarding workflow and wizard
- UCAS Apply preferences
- UCAS Apply preferences: Letters and alerts
- Postcodes
- Explaining transition
- Email asking for providers who are available 15-18 April for our first UCAS transition group
- UCAS settings and contacts
- Deleting and withdrawing courses
- Email about Publish changes in April
- Requesting a title
- Tabs on course pages
- New course wizard – As a Google Form
- Minimum course requirements – iterations
- Age ranges
- New location as a Google form
- An MVP for the first cohort transition from UCAS
- Email with video of new vacancies feature
- New course wizard – 9 April iteration
- Problems with a course
- Type of location MVP
- Tabs on locations
- Logic mapping UCAS eligibility questions to API codes
- Onboarding wizard as a Google form
- In what order should we build the Edit screens?
- Publishing during rollover
- What we shipped for UCAS transition
- Support for missing features
- Courses as an accredited body
- Highlighting the multiple organisations feature
- UCAS GCSE requirements – A read only MVP
- Show allocation policy on a course
- Emails for the new 2019/20 cycle
- Allocations process for 2020 – 2021
- Rollover – what we did in 2019
- Accredited bodies research - Reporting
- Accredited bodies research - Reporting round 2
- Accredited bodies research - Round 3
- Notifications MVP
- New course wizard as launched for accredited bodies
- Allocations alpha
- Managing notifications
- Managing users
- Managing notifications – feedback from universities
- New features for accredited bodies
- How will candidates apply for this course?
- Request PE courses as launched for accredited bodies
- Researching the needs of users with access to multiple organisations
- Notifications for users with access to multiple organisations
- Notifications iteration
- User personas as test accounts in Publish
- Uncoupling UK and EU course fees
- Rollover – what we did in 2020
- Visa sponsorship
- Degree entry requirements
- Pending GCSEs and equivalency tests
- Placement schools and training centres
- Visa sponsorship question wording change
- Updating the visa sponsorship guidance
- Improving content on the course pages
- Changing ‘applicants’ to ‘candidates’
- Removing UCAS content
- Adding questions about visa sponsorship to courses
- Audit of email notifications and improvements to content
- Managing individual email notifications
- Financial incentives for ancient language courses
- publish-adding-primary-navigation
- Managing and communicating rollover in 2021
- Simplifying how organisations manage their users
- Viewing training partners and their courses if you’re an accredited body
- Managing accredited bodies if you’re a lead school
- Reorganising organisation details
- Changes to the welcome email
- Updating button labels and success messages
- Giving lead schools the ability to manage permissions for their accredited bodies
- Giving accredited bodies the ability to manage courses they ratify
- Emailing accredited bodies when they have been added to a lead school or their permissions have changed
- Showing academic year on the course details page
- Showing financial support from the government
- Updating how organisations manage their locations
- publish-switching-recruitment-cycles
- Moving the position of course status and course actions
- Emailing users to let them know that courses will be rolled over soon
- Allowing users to manually rollover courses not previously published
- Adding guidance on how to use this service
- Improving the guidance on the course description pages
- Indicating unanswered questions with ‘not entered’
- Improving the course summary examples guidance page
- Reviewing course statuses
- Changing ‘cycle’ to ‘recruitment cycle’
- Updating how providers manage course vacancies
- Separating the ‘Published’ status into ‘Open’, ‘Closed’ and ‘Scheduled’ statuses
- Improving the content on the add and edit course flows
- Making course previews consistent with Find
- Making the visa sponsorship questions clearer
- Updating the ‘Check your answers’ and course details pages
- Adding an ‘Engineers teach physics’ question to courses
- publish-updated-bursaries-and-scholarships
- Showing course title on the ‘Check your answers’ page
- publish-error-pages
- Revising ‘Engineers teach physics’ content
- Updating the error messages displayed in the add and edit course flows
- publish-renaming-accredited-body-to-accredited-provider
- Improving how providers add schools
- Renaming ‘locations’ to ‘school placements’
- Adding a school when there is no JavaScript available
- Improving the course preview
- Improving how training partners manage their accredited providers
- publish-adding-accredited-provider-no-javascript
- Adding new guidance pages to ‘How to use this service’
- Managing and communicating rollover in 2022
- Removing course vacancies
- Updating organisation details
- Replacing the ‘Teaching apprenticeship’ question for accredited providers
- Creating a new provider onboarding form and accompanying email
- Adding ‘Study sites’
- publish-adding-study-site-no-javascript
- Including ‘Study sites’ in the course details
- User needs for Publish
Manage teacher training applications
A service for training providers to see, manage and make decisions on applications they receive
- First designs for a minimum viable service
- Fewer statuses
- New panels and application tables
- Application states
- Make an offer
- An interface for minimal service provision
- As launched on 26 November 2019
- Filtering applications
- Marketing page for providers
- Adding users
- Withdrawing an offer
- Offer a different course
- Offer panel
- Improving check and confirm content
- Timeline
- Tracking conditions individually
- Card layout for application list
- Process and rules for changing a course
- Giving teacher training providers longer to make decisions on applications because of coronavirus (COVID-19)
- Application layout changes
- Reasons for rejection
- Improved header
- Breaking apart the application page (sub navigation)
- Making a decision iteration 2
- Setting up permissions
- Setting up permissions (iteration 2)
- Setting up permissions (iteration 3)
- Setting up permissions (iteration 4)
- Reasons for rejection iteration 2
- Setting user permissions: context and user research
- Reasons for rejection iteration 3
- Notifications
- More context for providers
- Sorting by reject by default (RBD) date
- Displaying safeguarding information
- Selecting organisation level permissions by type
- Adding a note for the first time
- Research - end of cycle (exploratory)
- Deferring applications to the next cycle
- Reconfirming an offer for a deferred application
- Switching between cycles
- Exporting data
- Help users know what needs doing and what’s changed
- Showing international candidate and structured qualifications data
- Research – end of cycle (usability)
- Showing equality and diversity information to providers
- Managing applications across cycles (reconfirming deferred offers)
- Prompting users to set up permissions when changing a user’s access
- Prompting users to give feedback on automatically rejected applications
- Banner prompt iteration
- Deferring offers to the next cycle (iteration 2)
- Reconfirming a deferred offer (iteration 2)
- Data sharing agreement confirmation page
- Sub navigation iteration (moving away from tabs)
- Research - Notifications, Application List, Deferrals, Diversity Information, Data Export
- Deferring offers to the next cycle (iteration 3)
- Reconfirming a deferred offer (iteration 3)
- Who can make changes to offers
- Notifications iteration
- Account area and navigation
- Setting up notifications for the first time
- Dense application list layout
- Managing interviews
- Smaller headings
- Setting up permissions (iteration 5)
- Changing conditions iteration
- Tracking conditions individually iteration
- Banner prompt iteration 3
- Interviews iteration 2
- Making a decision iteration 3
- Changing an offer as of November 2020
- Changing an offer iteration
- Interviews iteration 3
- Reasons for rejection iteration 4 (emails)
- Timeline iteration 2
- Exporting data iteration 2
- Filter applications by full time or part time (study mode)
- Improvements for representing disability, safeguarding and interview information
- Let users turn email notifications on and off
- Search by candidate name or reference
- Closing an application (withdrawal versus rejection)
- Withdrawing an application
- Better feedback for automatically rejected applications
- Managing individual email notifications
- Show reasons why an offer is withdrawn
- Issues with changing an offer
- Application page improvements
- Showing when an offer will be automatically declined
- Filtering applications by subject
- Improving the activity log and timeline
- Removing the ‘future applications’ question from reasons for rejection
- Self-service registration for higher education institutions and their school direct partners
- Improving activity log and timeline again
- Show tuition fee status
- What to show when an application has been transferred to another provider
- Removing the subject field from notes
- Showing the automatic rejection date when setting up an interview
- Updating the name of the organisation which certifies international qualifications
- Cancelling upcoming interviews when making decisions
- Gathering school direct contact details from higher education institutions
- Withdrawing an application iteration 2
- Finding out what data our users need
- Adding a ‘cannot sponsor visa’ reason for rejection
- Improving organisational and user permissions
- Giving all users access to view their organisation’s users and permissions
- Let accredited body users set organisational permissions
- Creating a new permission allowing users to set up interviews
- Require users to choose an organisation before changing organisation settings
- Showing data about courses and candidates
- Providing a configurable course report and showing important data in one place
- Simplifying how we ask about and display permissions
- Providing status and progress reports alongside data exports
- Setting up organisational permissions when new partner courses are opened
- Moving organisational permissions guidance above the form
- Displaying permissions in the user list
- Clarifying that pages in ‘your account’ relate only to the current user
- Showing the organisation name when the user belongs to one organisation
- Showing partners when user permissions apply to all or none of the relationships
- Changing the filter labels for ‘courses run by’ and ‘courses ratified by’
- Application fraud research
- Application status and progress reports research
- Online chat research
- Organisation and user permissions research
- Changing ‘organisational’ to ‘organisation’
- Assigning applications to users
- Filtering applications by assigned user
- Helping users through online chat
- Unassigning applications when a user is deleted
- Telling users when a partner organisation sets permissions
- Adding user assignment to the timeline and activity log
- Application assignment research
- Data reports research
- Helping users check how candidates drop out of the application process
- Showing degree institution regardless of candidate nationality or application status
- Status label research
- Helping users check how quickly courses are filling up
- Swapping the ‘sign in’ and ‘get started’ calls to action on the service landing page
- Letting users download Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) data for the previous recruitment cycle
- Changing what we show to users who do not have permissions
- Changing the ‘accepted’ and ‘conditions met’ statuses
- Showing users where candidates choose to leave the application process
- Helping users check how diverse their candidates are
- Changing the terms for adding a user to and removing a user from an organisation
- Emailing users who are added to or removed from an organisation
- Emailing a candidate when the status of their conditions has been updated
- Removing ‘rejected by default’ from the email users receive when they do not make a decision in time
- Using clear and consistent file names for exported data
- Dividing the application process differently when we show how candidates choose to leave the process
- Anonymised applications research
- Finding the service research
- Personal statement research
- Reasons for rejection iteration 5
- Updating the service unavailable pages
- Adding guidance about dates and deadlines
- Changing the marketing page to a standard start page
- Iterating how we help users understand how diverse their candidates are
- Making it clearer that a candidate has chosen not to add A levels and other qualifications
- Adding a privacy notice for online chat
- Allowing a wider range of input formats for interview time
- Simplifying how we help users spot bias in their recruitment processes
- Helping users understand a candidate’s residency and immigration status
- Referring to recruitment cycles
- Review of provider emails
- Improving the qualifications section of the application details page
- Confirming a deferred offer iteration 3
- Deferring an offer iteration 3
- Making our prompts more consistent
- Emailing users when their permissions are updated
- Removing the complaints page and form
- Updating the personal statement questions on the application details page
- Reasons for rejection iteration 6
- Highlighting unexplained breaks in work history
- Letting providers change course before making an offer
- Updating make offer and change offer
- Finding out the effect of removing the reference number
- Emailing a candidate when their course details are changed
- Letting users turn off the email reminder to make a decision
- Hiding the sex, disability, ethnicity and age of candidates report
- Starting the Manage service on GOV.UK
- Changing an accepted offer
- Changing the way we use red warning buttons
- Making page titles consistent and more meaningful
- Changes to button labels and addition of warning text
- Changes to headings, caption text, success messages and timeline event titles
- Changes to the use and appearance of boxes
- Removing the phrase “through GOV.UK”
- Indicating unanswered questions with ‘not entered’
- Changes to the sign in flow when DfE Sign-in is unavailable
- Changing course when there are upcoming interviews or the training provider is changed
- Replacing reference number and candidate ID with application number
- Helping users find applications from the same candidate
- Sending users a weekly summary of notifications
- Improving the way we display who made changes in the timeline
- Withdraw an application iteration 3
- Helping users understand the effect of organisation permissions
- Sorting the application list in different ways
- Adding an overview page and filters to help users prioritise their work
- Comparing and processing applications across partner organisations
- Adding an interruption page to encourage users to give feedback on automatically rejected applications
- Only showing filters that return useful results
- Showing notes in the application list
- Helping users find applications which have not been looked at yet
- Explaining that notes are not shown to candidates
- Letting users change and delete notes
- Removing the individual note pages
- Moving the export data link to the application list
- Changing how notes are displayed
- Clarifying which notes are shown in the application list
- Emailing candidates about upcoming interviews when their course is changed
- Helping users decide whether to contact us about a sign in from a new device
- Changing how we show when an application was received on the application details page
- Changing the coloured boxes on the overview page
- Comparing and processing applications across partner organisations and training locations iteration 2
- Filters for prioritising important work (iteration 2)
- Filtering the activity log to show applications which were received recently
- Filtering the application list to show applications which were received recently
- Shortlisting an application
- Adding an application details bar to application pages
- Making references an offer condition
- Showing dates and deadlines for the next recruitment cycle
- Guidance about references when making an offer
- Adding a new page for references
- Revisiting reasons for rejection
- Helping users decide if candidates meet the initial teacher training criteria
- Rejection email previews
- Letting training providers recommend candidates to other providers
- Making subject knowledge enhancement courses an offer condition
- Adding a withdrawal reasons report
- Reporting on the diversity of applicants
- User needs for Manage
Register trainee teachers
A service for collecting and managing trainee teacher registration data
- Database of trainee teachers and providers
- Alpha prototype
- Beta prototype research (round 1)
- Beta prototype v1
- Beta prototype updates
- Beta prototype research (round 2)
- Recording training outcomes
- Beta prototype research (round 3)
- Collecting trainee start date
- Picking courses from Publish
- Recording training outcomes (iteration 2)
- Bulk actions on a group of records
- Selecting which degree a bursary was awarded for
- Reflect how providers work through the task list
- Initial support for users who work for multiple providers
- Collecting placement details
- Adding school direct routes
- Searching for a school (part 1)
- Investigating free text responses from Apply
- Setting the withdrawal date for deferred trainees
- Initial placements findings
- Searching for a school (part 2)
- Courses with multiple subjects
- Removing the highest academic qualification question
- Giving Register users service updates and latest news
- Apply integration - version 1
- Preventing browser auto-fill
- Highlighting invalid answers
- Using analytics to understand where our autocompletes could be improved
- Improvements to our autocompletes
- Changing route and courses for registered trainees
- Showing providers the funding they receive
- Revisiting how we identify current and past trainees
- Adding reports to Register to help users check their data
- Updating our support user interface
- Updating the ‘ITT end date’ field
- Adding support for iQTS
- Updating Register’s guidance pages
- Helping HEIs find trainees from a single year
- When everything’s gone wrong
- Collecting more useful information about why trainees withdraw
- Asking providers to sign off trainee data for the previous academic year
- Bulk awarding of teaching status
- Allowing users to edit records imported from HESA in Register
- Highlighting problems with trainee records
- Allowing providers to import applications with conditions pending
- No longer asking for a trainee’s home address
- User needs for Register trainee teachers
Support for Apply
A tool for support agents to manage the Apply for teacher training service
- Support for Apply as designed for MVP
- As launched on 26 November 2019
- Support – October 2020
- Improving the add user flow
- Updating the reasons for rejection report
- Improvements to the service performance dashboard
- User needs for Support for Apply
Support for Publish
A tool for support agents to manage the Publish postgraduate teacher training service
- support-adding-primary-navigation
- Updating organisation search and filters
- Adding users to an organisation
- support-switching-recruitment-cycles
- Adding multiple locations to an organisation
- Editing and removing organisation locations
- Adding and editing organisations
- Changing ‘locations’ to ‘schools’
- Managing accredited providers on behalf of training partners
- support-adding-accredited-provider-no-javascript
- User needs for Support for Publish