'Why I’m not convinced going to university is the right path' - West Midlands educationalist
Educationalist Roshan Doug explains why he thinks higher education has lost its way
This may sound like an odd confession coming from someone who has spent most of his adult life dealing with education policy, but here goes anyway.
I am no longer convinced that university is the right destination for as many young people as we seem determined to send there.
That is not a conclusion I have reached lightly.
In the past I have taught in schools, colleges and universities. I have spent decades collecting qualifications, attending lectures, examining students and sitting through enough government meetings to last several lifetimes.
For much of my career, I genuinely believed that higher education was one of the surest routes to opportunity and success. I still believe education can transform lives, but it’s not the ideal route for everyone.
What I have become sceptical about is the modern university system and the assumption that ever-increasing numbers of degrees automatically make for a better society.
Back in the day, things were very different. UCCA (later UCAS) candidates were interviewed and often thoroughly grilled by academics – often experts in their own field. The assumption was that you had to prove yourself worthy of a place. Today, universities sometimes seem more interested in recruiting customers than selecting students.
When I went to university in the early 1980s, only around seven per cent of the population held a degree. Higher education was still relatively unusual and a degree genuinely distinguished you from the crowd.
The university experience itself was different too. When I was working on my doctoral thesis, my supervisor called me into his office and handed me what amounted to the entire blueprint for a 70,000-word dissertation on a scrap of notebook paper barely larger than a credit card.
On it he had scribbled: ‘'Chapter 1 - Introduction. Chapter 2 - Literature Review. Chapter 3 – Methodology.'’. Then he sent me away.
That was it. No progress trackers. No support teams. No carefully managed milestones. The message was simple: ‘'Get on with it.'’.
In fact, I sometimes wonder whether he even read the first complete draft. Before I knew it, he was sending me off for the viva.
Looking back – and comparing with the range and depth of support today’s students receive – it seems extraordinary. Yet there was an expectation that students would learn to stand on their own intellectual feet. Universities saw themselves primarily as places of scholarship rather than customer-service centres.
I am not suggesting we should return entirely to those ‘good old days.’ Some of the support available to students today is undoubtedly beneficial. But somewhere along the way universities have become increasingly bureaucratic, managerial and commercial. Students have become consumers. Degrees have become products. And the question nobody wants to ask is whether the product is always worth the price.
Many students now leave university with debts running into tens of thousands of pounds. For some professions, that investment makes perfect sense. For many others, the return is far less obvious.
Governments of all political colours have spent years celebrating rising university participation rates. Yet remarkably little attention is paid to what happens afterwards. Where are the jobs?
Thousands of graduates leave university every year only to find themselves competing for a limited number of graduate-level positions. Many eventually enter occupations that previous generations accessed straight from school. Meanwhile employers are desperately searching for electricians, engineers, plumbers, technicians, care workers and skilled tradespeople. The contradiction could hardly be clearer.
Only last week I attended the funeral of the mother of a girl I went to school with. As often happens on such occasions, several old school friends were there. During the wake we sat chatting, reminiscing and comparing notes on the roads our lives had taken.
To the best of my knowledge, none of them had university degrees. Yet every one of them possessed intelligence, common sense and worldly wisdom in abundance. They had built careers, raised families, run businesses, overcome hardships and learned life’s lessons the old-
fashioned way - by living them.
It reminded me that academic qualifications are not the sole measure of ability. Some of the wisest and most capable people I have known never attended university.
The uncomfortable truth is that Britain does not simply have an education problem. It has a jobs problem. We have become obsessed with qualifications while paying insufficient attention to creating meaningful, secure and well-paid employment.
University remains essential for many professions, and for many young people it will continue to be the right choice. But not everyone needs a degree. Not everyone wants one.
And not everyone benefits from one. The apprentice learning a skilled trade should be valued every bit as much as the undergraduate sitting in a lecture theatre. Surely the purpose of education is to help people discover their talents and fulfil their potential, not funnel everyone through the same institutional gateway.
For me, the real measure of success is not how many eighteen-year-olds we send to university. It is whether they leave education of any kind with the skills, opportunities and prospects needed to build a decent life.
At the moment, I am not convinced we are getting that balance right. And coming from a lifelong academic – who has been studying copious reports – that is not something I ever expected to say.