A-level crisis has its roots in Tony Blair’s university reforms – Yorkshire Post Letters

THERE is no doubt education in 2020 has been a fiasco, not all to do with Gavin Williamson (The Yorkshire Post, August 19).

The problem seems to have started with Tony Blair saying 50 per cent of pupils should go to university, without saying whether this was for their own benefit, to swell the already over generous salaries of university vice-chancellors or merely to delay their entry on to the unemployment register.

The intimation that a university degree opens the door to lucrative careers is palpably misleading, as many graduates have found to their cost.

Tony Blair’s edict led to the decision by many hitherto successful polytechnics to change to universities and, over the years, we have seen a proliferation of courses on nonsensical topics just to maximise the fee income needed by some of those universities.

We need plumbers, electricians, engineers, doctors and nurses before more civil servants, solicitors and politicians.

Before seeking university education, students need to be clear in their own mind what they hope to pursue at the end of it.

To this end they need advice, not so much from friends telling them of the marvellous freedom to enjoy the wide-ranging social distractions on offer, but with meetings with parents and careers teachers who can look at their strengths and advise whether they can achieve their goals at university or not. Work experience can help in the decision process and, in some cases to my knowledge, has led to job offers being made without the burden of a student loan to repay.

Universities should make public the number of students leaving at the end of year one, the subjects studied and amount of debt accrued.

It is these young people the education system is failing by encouraging them into a level of learning beyond their capabilities. There are thousands of talented and dedicated young people with supportive parents and teachers to help them achieve their ambitions.

A good education is best achieved by co-operation between pupils, parents and teachers, with minimum guidance from LEAs and no interference from party politics or unions.

The annual mass influx of overseas students demonstrates we have one of the finest education systems in the world – let’s keep it that way and get all schools back safely in September.

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Thank you

James Mitchinson

Editor