Degree apprenticeships are levelling up in action for Yorkshire - Sheffield Hallam's Conor Moss

The White Paper outlined 12 missions including a promise of “hundreds of thousands more people completing high quality skills training every year”.

Key regional anchor institutions – such as universities – working alongside businesses and other organisations will be crucial if the Government is to succeed in its skills mission.

Providing place-based opportunities and helping to address regional skills gaps has been on university leaders’ agendas for many years and I strongly believe degree apprenticeships play an integral part in that.

Degree apprenticeships were launched in England in 2015 offering a combination of on-the-job learning and academic theory. The prospect of gaining industry-specific skills, a university-accredited degree qualification with fees paid by government and employer, meant they have grown rapidly in popularity.

My own university, Sheffield Hallam, was an early adopter of degree apprenticeships with the first courses launching in autumn 2015. It now has more than 2,000 degree apprentices currently studying on the widest range of apprenticeship courses in the country in sectors including healthcare, construction, IT and engineering – all of which are vital for our regional economic prosperity. As well as playing a vital role in tackling skills gaps and raising productivity, all the evidence shows that degree apprenticeships are an important vehicle for increasing social mobility.

In 2021, 44 per cent of our apprentices were from geographical areas with the lowest number of young people participating in higher education, compared to 41 per cent studying a traditional university degree.

More than half are over the age of 21 when they start, with around 15 per cent over the age of 35 wanting to upskill or reskill. One such mature learner is Heather, a physiotherapy degree apprentice who’s worked as an assistant practitioner at Rotherham NHS Trust for six years. She had been inspired by the physiotherapists she worked alongside and was keen to progress her career but had reached the ceiling in her current role without further qualifications. With ‘life getting in the way’ she didn’t feel as though she could stop work and go back to university to pursue her career goals – until a degree apprenticeship came along. She’s now on the path to becoming a qualified physiotherapist.

Health professions such as physiotherapy and occupational therapy are just a couple of the innovative industries that apprenticeships are now available in – already helping to address NHS workforce challenges in our region.

As we emerge from the pandemic, skills shortages in many industries are coming into sharper focus.

There is a particular skills shortage in technical occupations like Engineering, Construction and Digital where graduates are in high demand. Degree apprenticeships are perfectly placed to address that – supporting current employees to upskill and developing new work-ready talent. Providing a work-ready talent pool for local employers is one of Sheffield Hallam University’s commitments as part of its Civic University Agreement – a set of key pledges to the region to support it to prosper. Expanding our portfolio of degree apprenticeships is one of the ways we will deliver on that commitment.

This week we launched a new apprenticeship programme in partnership with FDM Group, a professional services provider with a focus on technology, that is set to create 500 jobs. We also run one of the largest policing degree apprenticeship programmes with South Yorkshire Police. We have almost 200 policing degree apprentices training to become the officers who will serve this region in years to come while also gaining a degree qualification.

At a time when universities are thinking about their value, degree apprenticeships are one tangible way to demonstrate how they are delivering socially and economically for their regions.

Degree apprenticeships are providing meaningful opportunities that are upskilling our region’s workforce and delivering a boost to productivity as well as having a positive impact on people’s lives. If that’s not levelling up in action – I don’t know what is.

Conor Moss is Professor of Work-Based Learning at Sheffield Hallam University.