Recruiters claim UK has ‘too many graduates’
In a week’s time the Government will face a vote on its controversial Higher Education Bill, which includes the introduction of variable top-up fees to help fund the expansion of HE in Britain. But a survey out today from the Association of Graduate Recruiters has suggested that more than half of companies thought there were already too many graduates in the UK.
The Government wants 50% of young people to attend university by 2010, but 53% of respondents said that figure was too high, while 60% claimed that increases in student numbers are having an adverse effect on the quality of graduates.
HE participation in the late 1980s was just 14%; that more than doubled over eight years to 33% in 1995, and in the last eight years the figure has risen again to 43% of young people.
The motivation behind the Government’s desire to see it rise further is the need to encourage more young people from lower socio-economic groups to attend university.
However, opponents of the proposed top-up fees have suggested that the fear of leaving university with a possible £9,000 of debt in tuition fees alone will deter exactly those people that the Government wants to encourage.
Speaking at the AGR’s conference in London yesterday, Higher Education Minister Alan Johnson stressed, however, that most of the expansion in HE would come from newer universities, which have a track record of taking applicants from working-class backgrounds.
The Government also revealed last year that its 50% target does not rely solely on degree courses, and will conclude new two-year ‘foundation’ degrees in vocational subjects.
If that system works it could mollify employers by solving genuine skills shortages, rather than producing graduates who are not trained for the business environment – a complaint made by over a third of companies surveyed by the AGR.
