DP teaches at a UTC from what I've learnt...the yr10 intake means it tends to attract the bullied (unhappy at previous secondary) and the bullies (excluded from previous secondary), the curriculum looks super exciting on paper and in the prospectus but the reality is that in yr10 and yr11 kids are just getting thru' a specialist subset of GCSE's (often not meeting EBACC requirements) and don't actually do any 'hands on' practical stuff in reality, it's hard to attract teachers for some of the specialist subjects that outside of UTC's are really only taught at FE level and some arrive with little understanding of teaching a large class of youngish teeenagers or poor classroom managment skills (and may be on contracts where they can leave on a month's or so's notice as they are a kinda free shool and so are not required to observe standard teaching contracts) , kids and parent's don't realise that BTEC's are often far from a 'soft option' and the way they are assessed makes for a heavy workload. They are however remarkably good at getting work exp placements and getting kids on to higher level apprenticehips.
Government commitment to the UTC model doesn't seem great, I would not send my own kids to one.