‘I’ve seen thousands of apprentices reach great heights’
For years, university was deemed the only option for ambitious young people. Now that’s changed. Today’s teenagers can make a decision. If they want to study an academic subject such as ancient history (as I did at Bristol University in the early 2000s), university is there. But if they want to earn while they learn, in an industry that excites them, apprenticeships have become a fantastic option.
And the good news is that you can land a brilliant job either way. Many parents associate apprenticeships with manual jobs, but the fastest growing fields for apprenticeships are in technology and professional services. Some of the world’s best companies – including Facebook, WPP, Google and Mercedes-benz – now recruit non-graduates. I’ve seen thousands of apprentices reach great heights through my start-up.
Getting half of all young people to university made sense when the commitment was made over 20 years ago. Back then, it was widely thought that more people going to university meant a more skilled workforce, plus a wider spread of opportunity. But since, we’ve seen a major disconnect between the content universities teach and the skills employers need, exacerbated by the pace of technological change.
The expansion of student numbers didn’t create the level playing field some thought it would. Almost half of those accepted on to top corporate graduate schemes went to private school, for example. Since the introduction of £9,000-plus tuition fees, one in five graduates would have been financially better off had they never gone to university, according to the Institute for Fiscal Studies.
For years, apprenticeships were thought of as an inferior option, and schools struggled to point pupils in their direction. But their reputation has shot up; during the pandemic, our apprentices remained remarkably sticky in their jobs, while many of their peers were being laid off or furloughed. We now train as many apprentices from the wealthiest households as the poorest.