'The right degree is always worth it'

By David Ellis

I hope someday the British will feel as strongly about education as they do about tea, or avoiding eye contact on public transport. 

Rather regrettably, I’m not sure they will: lately I’ve noticed degrees being denounced both in the press and in the pub, as if university has become a byword for ‘rip-off’. 

In fact, the querulous whine of ill-informed commentators is overwhelming. A degree, apparently, is little more than deadweight debt and the greatest purpose a university serves is introducing partygoers to each other. I hear this country's dogs are going down the drain, or something. 

The problem comes, as problems usually come, from bad answers to good questions. ‘What’s the value of a university education?’ does carry a certain implicit jeering, but it should be taken seriously. 

The answer is easy: by any standard, financial or otherwise, a degree is a benefit to students and to society. While it’s true a degree doesn’t equate to automatic success and riches, the individual is not exempt from any responsibility, and a mediocre graduate is not a sign that – in 60s speak – the ‘system has failed them.’ 

It makes little sense to repeatedly push sixth-formers into university, but it is equally absurd that those who want to study are put off by a doltish mob slandering the value of education. 

Worryingly, the trend to regard students as consumers is on the up. Tuition fees are stacked against contact hours and percentages and statistics are flung out: what right-minded individual regards ‘cost-per-lecture’ as a meaningful measure of how decent an education is? It is a trite, lazy figure: a good student can never be a consumer, they must be a participant. 

Nevertheless, there are those who persist in looking at university as a matter of costs – and, in fairness, it’s the logic our government uses to persuade young people that higher education is worthwhile. 

Recently, university think tank million+ noted that, accounting for the costs of university, graduates earn an average of £115,000 more than non-graduates over their lifetime. The Department for Business, Innovation and Skills goes a little further, estimating £200,000 or more. 

These figures speak for themselves, though it should be noted the sums are bolstered by the high wages of doctors, lawyers and so forth, and there is no guarantee every graduate will earn this premium. Subject choice is crucial. It isn’t about higher education being good or bad, it’s about choosing your course and institution with care. 

This said, it’s been noted that one in five graduates earn less than the average for someone who left education with A-levels alone. This seems faintly shocking, until the statistic is flipped: this means 80% of graduates earn the same or more than the average for A-level leavers, with rather proves that university has put them at a distinct advantage. 

Last week, I noted that 91% of agricultural science graduates are employed with an average salary of £28,600 and a comment remarked that with £800 training, a person could drive an HGV and earn similar money. 

The average HGV salary is actually nearer £26k, but regardless. This argument, in one form or another, rears its scaly head regularly, but it rather misses the point: it is undoubtedly true one can earn good money without going to university, but that is not the sole reason people go. 

While the hypothetical agricultural science graduate could well earn similar money driving an HGV, they probably wanted to work in an area they liked – and hence studied to do so. University is the chance to better your understanding of a subject you’re passionate about; it has never been a get-rich-quick deal. 

In fact, owing to the repayment structure of the loans, those whose degrees aren’t rewarded with a decent salary will not have to repay the money borrowed, so the risk to an individual is minimal. 

Then there are the benefits to the economy. Students are precious: the net benefit to financing a degree is £94,000 to the exchequer – by extension, benefiting the taxpayer. 

The million+ also states that: “If it transpires that 30,000 fewer undergraduates enrol into higher education in 2012-13, then this would lead to an equivalent loss of £6.6 billion to the UK economy over the next 40 years.” 

£6.6 billion. Hardly spare change: students are a valuable national asset. Of course, this raises the obvious worry that the government sneakily encourages students to attend university not for their personal benefit, but for the good of the economy. However, if the student earns more and the treasury earns more because of this, it’s hard to see how anyone loses. 

This is the maths done, for now, and it falls firmly in favour of students. There are other attractions too. Though university is somewhat about independence, meeting new people, breaking free from the constraints of childhood, having the time and space to think, the chance to develop and explore new passions, there are another two completely vital advantages I see. 

Aside from the obvious – that education, learning and knowledge should be celebrated rather than condemned – university is about the honing of a critical, thoughtful mind and about having the time to properly consider what you’re doing. 

Had it been practical, at eighteen, I would have trained to be a lawyer. However, university was time to sit and read and follow through with other ambitions, like – unfortunately for you, perhaps – writing. 

Ultimately, though, it is incomprehensible that anyone would argue against learning, as if it were some hideous disease which should have died out in the middle ages, or as if the acquisition of knowledge should be thought of only in fiscal rewards. 

It is appalling that the idea of enjoying a subject and – heaven forbid – engaging the brain is considered unworthy of any expenditure. 

Finally comes the criticism that university is not as it was. To which I ask: as it was when? When the state made little back from graduates? Or when underdeveloped minds from the upper echelons were given a place at the top universities in favour of the most deserving? When university entrance was even less of a level playing field than it is today? 

The working world has vastly changed: young people face an unappetising market where many of the traditional roles have disappeared with technology in their place. There simply isn’t enough work to go around – but those with a degree stand a better chance of getting it. 

They have more options: those who don’t go stand little chance of getting past the thousands of job adverts all demanding university qualifications. 

Like anything, though, a degree is what a person makes of it. Its value is as reliant on the course, the teaching and the institution as it is on the individual. With or without a degree, people will continue to have meteoric successes and crashing failures. 

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Sixth formers should not be mis-sold the idea that university equates success, but they should know that – with the caveats above – those with a degree are more likely to earn more and will find their career choices less limited. Those of us already in the workforce should know that students will likely add more to the economy and that we will have a better educated workforce. 

The next time someone asks if a degree has any value, the answer can only be an emphatic ‘yes’. What I want to know is: who is complaining about other people’s educational choices? And why? Telegraph