Gillian Keegan is concerned that higher education is simply a default position for parents, teachers and students
It is, as Gillian Keegan puts it, the “well-worn path” for school-leavers. But the Education Secretary is concerned that many teenagers are simply going to universities as a default position, guided by parents and teachers who are also less familiar with alternative routes.
“I think a lot of people go to university because they don’t know what else to do,” says Ms Keegan.
The 55-year-old who now oversees the country’s schools and universities started work aged 16 as an apprentice at Delco Electronics – a subsidiary of General Motors – a short distance from the Catholic comprehensive school she attended in Knowsley, Merseyside.
Contemporaries who went to university and then joined the same firm “never really caught up because I had years of relationships and business experience. I was managing teams before they even started work”.