A push by businesses to persuade people they don't need a degree to get ahead has lost some momentum, Trade Me admits.

More than 100 companies, including ASB, Fonterra, Spark, Trade Me and Xero, signed an "open letter" last year, declaring tertiary qualifications were not required for a range of roles within their workplaces.

Instead, the focus during recruitment would be on assessing skills, attitudes, motivation, and the adaptability of applicants, they assured prospective employees.

GRANT MATTHEW/STUFF The bubble isn't about to burst for formal qualifications, if Trade Me job listings are anything to go by.

The companies said the "NZ Talent" initiative was a response to the talent shortage the country faced, particularly in the fields of technology, science, design and innovation.

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Education "futurist" Frances Valintine, founder of The Mind Lab, which has provided digital technology courses for more than 150,000 schoolchildren and 4500 teachers, said 220 organisations subscribed to NZ Talent in the end, with the technology industry "leading the way".

But a special section set up on Trade Me Jobs to advertise vacancies under NZ Talent's banner of "No Qualifications Required" was sporting fewer than 200 listings last week.

Many of those vacancies were for labourers, supermarket check-out operators and low-level administrators, for roles paying less than $25 an hour.

Some of the remaining vacancies advertised as "no qualifications required" – for example as a finance manager at Fonterra – stated that a relevant tertiary qualification would in fact be beneficial.

SUPPLIED Trade Me Jobs boss Jeremy Wade says the number of job listings being advertised as "no qualifications required" is a little disappointing.

Ruth McDavitt, who sits on the advisory board of Victoria University's School of Engineering and Computer Science and who runs the "Summer of Tech" internship programme for tertiary students, said she was not surprised.

"I was super sceptical about it when it first came out because it did seem to be a 'PR' exercise," she said.

"I am not saying tertiary qualifications are a perfect match for what the skills might be, but it is very rare for people to be work-ready for high-tech jobs straight out of school – they do need some form of higher education."

Trade Me Jobs head Jeremy Wade said it was a "little bit disappointed" by the number of listings.

The NZ Talent initiative relied on people volunteering their time and had been impacted by supporters changing roles and having other priorities, he said.

But he said Trade Me had not given up on it, and believed it had contributed to a useful debate.

SUPPLIED The Mind Lab founder Frances Valintine sees the value of traditional university education declining.

Wade said McDavitt's point about younger people not always being "work ready" was a good one. But he was concerned school careers advice was "quite broken", which could contribute to people making study decisions that they later regretted.

Currently, about a fifth of full-time university students and a quarter of polytech students fail to complete their qualifications, according to the Tertiary Education Commission.

Wade remained unconvinced that "three-year degrees" were where the future lay for education, arguing it might often be better for people to earn "micro-credentials" by undertaking small blocks of learning through their careers.

JOHN NICHOLSON/STUFF Ruth McDavitt from Summer of Tech isn't surprised NZ Talent has been bit a bit of fizzer.

"What we are talking about is just more options and people will decide for themselves what is right."

Valintine said she saw interest in the "traditional qualification model" decreasing.

She also advocates embracing "nano" or micro-credentials that involve "bite-sized" learning over perhaps 20 years, rather than doing three full years' tertiary education "up front".

Her eldest child is studying music at university, but Valintine said she would not be at all concerned if none of her other three children opted for a degree.

"I think a gap year after high school is the best thing anyone can do before you make a decision of what you want to study."

ASB spokeswoman Holly Ryan said NZ Talent had shown that many business leaders were "eager to inspire school leavers in navigating career options".

The bank had gone on to create an "online hub" providing school leavers with practical information on skills development, she said.

"Its aim is to empower school-leavers by giving them access to business leaders who have taken varied paths to success."

Victoria University computer science lecturer Simon McCallum said a Sunday Star-Times report about a Massey University student who had found it impossible to get an internship in the supposedly in-demand field of IT had prompted debate in academic circles.

McCallum was keen to explore whether it might be possible to establish a new model for tertiary education that would see universities pay for some students' education in return for perhaps 6 per cent of their earnings for a 10-year period, five years after they graduated.

Academics' pay, above a base rate, could be tied to their students' earnings so they also had skin in the game, with that income effectively becoming their pension plan, he said.

"I personally believe in the value I add to my students, so it is the kind of risk I want to take."

McCallum said much of the real value of university lay in group work and other learning that happened outside of tested assignments.

But NCEA had taught students to be "strategic" in how they allocated their time and to minimise their "non-graded" activities.

That was compounded by the current need to pay upfront for university, which meant many students also had to take on part-time work, he said.

"The big shift that I would like to propose is to change to an 'income share agreement' model. How that works is instead of taking an upfront fee, we become a 'small investor' in the student."

The model would also mean universities had an incentive to provide ongoing support and professional development to their alumni, he said.

Purdue University in Indiana in the United States has pioneered the model for its computer science degrees. Caps on repayments meant high-fliers did not end up paying back fortunes, The Economist said reporting on its scheme.

McCallum said the model would need to start off small and would work best for students studying subjects such as computer science, accounting and law, which students might be studying primarily for their own direct financial benefit.

Māori organisations might want to play the role of institutional investors for Māori students, as an alternative to supporting them through grants, he believed.

"Instead of throwing money at scholarships and having all of their capital disappear, they could invest and get their money back, so they could invest in the next round of students."