Forget uni - get a real job, says education head

By THERESA GARNER

School-leavers are being advised to forgo a degree and get a lucrative blue-collar job to help the country solve chronic skills shortages.

In a statement that has sent ripples through academia, the Government's Tertiary Education Commission - set up to help the drive for a "knowledge economy" - suggests that too many people are going to university.

Commission chairman Andrew West suggests parents' desires for their children to gain a degree are often detrimental.

"Many parents want their children to have a secondary school education that leads to a degree ... We need to ask - is that always in the individual's best interests and how many graduates does this country need?"

Industry training organisations yesterday welcomed the statement, but University of Auckland vice-chancellor Dr John Hood would not comment.

Dr West said there were growing skill shortages in trades and technical areas, yet more than half the 300,000 people undertaking tertiary study were at degree level or higher.

The workforce will begin to shrink after 2021, and as the school year begins the commission has urged students to give "serious consideration to the study choices they make and the careers they pursue".

New Zealand is dependent on having "people with the right skill mix to power our businesses and industries. It would appear we don't have the best mix at the moment".

Vice-Chancellors Committee executive director Lindsay Taiaroa said he supported a "balance of skills" across the tertiary sector.

Dr West said many New Zealanders mistakenly thought a knowledge economy was "working indoors and using a computer".

But agriculture, fishing and horticulture were vital to the economy and would continue to be.

School-leavers should also consider the debt burden of a degree.

The average student loan is $13,680. Industry trainees have no such burden as they "earn as they learn".