T Levels: The Employer Support Fund

The Employer Support Fund is available to support employers with legitimate costs and enable them to offer placements. The fund is for students who start a placement between 1 April 2023 and 31 March 2024.

The fund lasts a year and its aim is to secure a pipeline of T Level industry placements built on strong relationships between employers and providers.

T Level providers, who have received an allocation based on the number of T Level students they have on programme, manage the funding. Providers are responsible for working with employers to best use their funds. Providers may choose to use the funding where it is hardest to source industry placements and to engage employers who are not otherwise able to deliver them.

If you wish to make a claim for the extra costs of hosting a student starting a placement during this period, you should discuss this with your provider as soon as possible.

How much can you claim

You can claim funding for every student you are offering a placement to. The maximum amount of funding that any one employer can claim is £25,000. This is a total value which includes funding from all providers the employer is working with.

There is no limit on the amount that can be claimed for a student, but the costs must be eligible (see below). If two or more employers share a placement as part of a delivery approach, each employer can claim for their additional costs.

You can only claim for costs that you have actually incurred. You must provide details of these costs in an ‘Employer Declaration Form’.

Eligible Costs

There are three types of eligible costs:

• Administrative costs:
  • These are the direct costs of:
    • Setting up processes, procedures and systems for the placement
    • Providing a physical workspace for the student, including renting extra space if needed.
• Training costs
  • these are the direct costs of:
    • Providing staff with the practical skills to support students on placements, e.g. mentoring.
    • Training may be delivered in various ways including workshops, internal guides or online courses.
• Tangible costs
  • these are costs of:
    • operating the placement such as PPE or other equipment, insurance, security passes, mandatory vaccinations, mandatory training, software licensing, materials and supplies, supervising the student on placement, and transport for the student.
    • Employers may also claim for organising additional training that enables a student to gain full value from the placement. This includes training before the placement starts.

Further resources

Click on the links below for more guidance on the Employer Support Fund. This includes detailed funding rules and template for the Employer Declaration Form.

Funding boost to support T Level roll out – T Levels and industry placement support for employers

Employer Support Fund – T Levels and industry placement support for employers

Employer Support Fund – Funding rules
Employer Support Fund – Employer Declaration Form
Employer Support Fund – Employer Guidance