We have created a generation of graduates about as useful as a longbow against a tank
When I was an apprentice plumber, nobody pretended that spending years learning a skill guaranteed success. You still had to work hard, turn up on time and prove yourself. But at least the training was relevant to the job you hoped to do.
Today we are throwing money at an education system that does the exact opposite.
According to a new report based on Government data, half of all graduates are earning less than the national median wage five years after leaving university. More than 150,000 graduates a year fail to reach even £35,000, while 11 per cent are earning less than £24,000. Only 57 per cent are in full-time work 15 months after graduating and at least a third are not even in graduate jobs.
At what point do we stop and ask whether this system is actually working?
If the British Army decided tomorrow that the best way to deal with the threat from Putin’s Russia was to train soldiers to use longbows, we would rightly laugh them out of the room. Yet our education system is doing something remarkably similar.
Of course we need graduates. We need doctors, dentists, engineers, scientists, software developers, architects and lawyers. These professions require specialist academic training and always will. But we also need to be honest that a degree is not a degree.
The only thing a medical student and an undergraduate studying one of many low value courses have in common is that they sit under the same roof during lectures. Their likely career outcomes, earning potential and employment prospects are worlds apart.
That is not an attack on arts subjects. There are successful careers in media, performing arts, creative industries and many other fields. But where is the honesty?
Why aren’t young people being shown the percentage chance of securing work in those industries? Why aren’t they being told the likely starting salaries and long-term earnings before they sign up? Why aren’t schools presenting the risks as clearly as the rewards?
Instead, too many teenagers are sold a simple message, get a degree and success will follow, but the evidence increasingly suggests that for many students that is a lie. I won’t speculate too much on what forces perpetuate such a lie except to wonder who benefits from tuition fees?
The situation becomes even more absurd when we look at the finances. Britain now has around £266 billion in outstanding student loan debt. Much of it will never be repaid. We call them loans, but for huge numbers of graduates they function more like grants funded by taxpayers.
A typical graduate now leaves university with debts running into tens of thousands of pounds. According to the report, some would need to earn £66,000 just to cover the interest accumulating on those loans.
Meanwhile, Britain faces chronic shortages of skilled workers. The construction industry alone is estimated to be around one million workers short of what it needs over the coming years. We desperately need plumbers, electricians, bricklayers, carpenters, roofers, heating engineers and countless other skilled trades.
At the same time, forecasts suggest the number of young people not in education, employment or training could reach 1.25 million within five years.
Can someone please do the maths? We have businesses crying out for skilled workers, nearly a million young people disconnected from work and training, and a university system producing tens of thousands of graduates whose qualifications are failing to deliver the careers they were promised.
This should not be a political argument. It should be common sense. If a course consistently leaves graduates with poor employment prospects and low earnings, stop pretending it is a golden ticket. Tell applicants the truth. Publish the outcomes. Publish the salaries. Publish the likelihood of finding relevant work.
Then give equal status, equal funding and equal prestige to apprenticeships and vocational training. If you took a fraction of the money currently disappearing into unrecoverable student debt and use it to help employers pay apprentice wages, train young people and create real careers it would move the dial.
The answer is staring us in the face. Stop selling dreams that implode into debts. Start funding skills that build futures.
The truth might be uncomfortable, but it is a lot kinder than sending another generation into a system that costs a bomb and delivers oblivion.
