‘University isn’t for everyone,’ says Vicki Thomson, chief executive of Australia’s Group of Eight, calling for a slowing of growth in place numbers

This article is more than 4 years old

This article is more than 4 years old

Uncapping university places has caused a glut of graduates and driven a view that not holding a degree is a “failure”, the chief executive of the Group of Eight universities has said.

Vicki Thomson has called for a slowing in the growth in places, arguing that “university isn’t for everyone” in a speech to the Graduate Employability and Industry Partnerships forum in Sydney in Monday.

But the call was rejected by Macquarie University deputy vice-chancellor John Simons, who described the idea universities could produce too many graduates as “frankly bizarre”.

Thomson complained that there were “areas of significant graduate oversupply”, resulting in baristas with honours in law, mining engineers working at Officeworks and marketing majors working in bakeries.

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She said in New South Wales there were 47,000 people seeking work as full-time teachers, almost as many as are currently employed by the education department.

Thomson said that “in isolation” it was “gratifying and exciting” that the demand-driven admission system had meant that almost 40% of Australians aged 25 to 34 had an undergraduate degree.

But she said the increase had devalued trades and some degrees, including arts.

A bachelor level degree has replaced high school matriculation as the basic requirement for employment, pushing some students to further study and locking others who lack them out of jobs.

“We know more and more graduates feel they have to keep studying, to seek out a master’s – and with it more student debt – to give them a career edge, or even parity in some cases.”

Enrolments between 2009 and 2014 grew about 26% in bachelor degrees and 41% for master’s degrees.

Thomson said job ads for roles in recruitment, administration and property development now stated “a degree qualification is a must”.

This was part of an “uncomfortable trend that risks diminishing a university education and sends concerning signals to job seekers”.

“That is not being elitist, it is simply fact.”

Simons told Guardian Australia increasing student numbers reflected that “what is needed is a highly educated citizenship that have those skills like problem-solving, communication, Stem [science, technology, engineering, mathematics] that are the mark of graduates”.

He said the fact some jobs now required degrees meant those jobs and the complexity of the context in which they were done was changing.

Simons questioned the evidence for oversupply of graduates, and said students studying law might not intend to become lawyers but undertook the degree to improve their employment choices.

“This is the same old argument that was around in the UK over 30 years ago when mass education was introduced – a student said when she wanted to study English her father asked what she would do for work, open an English shop?”

“Nobody ever considered that an argument against mass education then. It’s a strange and bizarre intervention now.”

Thomson said that lacking a degree was now considered “failure”, citing anecdotal evidence that family aspirations were diverting students away from trades training at Tafe.

“Why are we all so reticent about stating the obvious – that university isn’t for everyone. It was never intended for everyone.

“Equally, there should never have come a point where entering a trade was seen as a lesser pathway.”

Thomson said the unintended consequences of the demand-driven system had left graduates with “broken dreams and a large student debt”.

She noted the proportion of new bachelor degree graduates in full-time work was lower now than during and immediately after the 1990s recession and the worst it had been since the early 1980s, despite decades of continuous growth.