Education opens doors, and the expansion of higher education begun under New Labour means that millions of young people who would not previously have gone from school to university have now done so. From 336,000 places accepted in 1997, the total rose by 68% to 563,000 in 2022. In last year’s student experience survey, just 11% of undergraduates said that they regretted their decision to take a degree.
In an interview with this newspaper at the weekend, Prof Shitij Kapur, the vice-chancellor of King’s College London, stressed that one consequence of this increased access has been that degrees no longer confer a virtually automatic graduate job. His likening of a degree to a visa – or a “chance” rather than a guarantee – was striking, and he is right that the increased difficulties of graduates in finding suitable work must be taken seriously. Along with rising student debt and the less favourable terms now attached to loans, this tighter graduate job market explains why, having reached Tony Blair’s target of 50% in 2017, the proportion of young people now going to university has since fallen.
