As the dust settles after the general election and the Queen’s Speech, the new government begins to grapple with the prospect of delivering Brexit.
The Brexit debate generates plenty of heat, but it’s the white heat of technological advancement that will mean huge change to the jobs of 2030. Add that to the obvious question about what skills we’ll need to “home grow” in the absence of free labour movement, and the skills gap is brought into sharper relief.
Combine this with the persistent education under-achievement in parts of the country, and that skills gap starts to look like a skills crisis.
So the new government’s plans to improve technical education are welcome, and their simplicity looks appealing. Students will choose academic routes on the one hand or technical routes on the other. But we need to beware simplicity becoming simplistic.
Higher education, after all, is not only academic. Our best universities are the engines of engineering, design and technology. They have a key role to play in closing the skills gap.
We must avoid a bifurcated system of rigid tracks. We need a coherent education system that delivers high-quality and flexible options for everyone to keep learning; a system of bridges and ladders that makes the most of our talent, and keeps us all learning with an ability to step off, work, and step back into education again.
We will need a system that delivers demanding high standards in three key pathways: the kind of academic skills we see in A levels, broader career preparation that we see in BTECs and specific occupation/job skills that will be represented by the government’s planned T levels and more apprenticeships.
These routes will all provide real opportunities for young people, and we know from our research that employers value all these different kinds of qualifications, often preferring a mixture of the academic and the technical to a purely academic or technical route.
Collaboration is crucial
As the government undertakes complex Brexit negotiations, it might wish to think about how we will undertake the long-term planning that will meet this generational challenge.
In the highly charged political situation we find ourselves in, I believe the government should consider the establishment of an independent body or commission that will define a strategy for our education system that meets the skills challenge over the long term. A system that can stand up to short-term political pressures and the risk of rushed, ineffectual implementation; a system that puts the role of great teaching centre stage; one whose inclusive mission is to enable all sections of society to realise their true potential; one that ensures people can keep learning throughout their lives as they adapt to a radically changing workplace.
Ministers would continue to take decisions and advance legislation, but such a body would enable them to do so on the basis of evidence-based strategic thinking. The government’s programme gives me hope that there is a steely determination to address the skills challenge.
But no one group, including government, can provide all the answers. I hope the government will demand both collaboration and long-term thinking from all of us in education who care about children and their futures, above all else.
Rod Bristow is the president of Pearson, UK and Core Markets
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