Post Election, EEUK is looks forward to hearing the details behind the manifesto promises.

With many looking for a new model for HE, picking up on issues across the sector as well as ones that impact our work directly, such as visa issues.

EEUK is seeking a vision and long-term commitment which might with the call from  The Entrepreneurs Network and YBI (Youth Business International (June 2023) for enterprise education in schools (Empowering the Future) based on their previous work as to “what applied learning really looks like” (Jan 2023). This calls for under-18s to be able open business bank accounts without credit facilities to help them separate personal and business finances from a young age, as well as calling for transversal skills to be the key (which EntreComp is) seeking that essential skills that necessary to be entrepreneurial are embedded across the curriculum from primary school/

Ensuring the education system is “fit for an entrepreneur” is a message also being heralded across Wales, with the launch of their new resources for schools which draws upon competency-based questioning as progression points and shares links to additional resources

Wales has also announced that CTER will Medr (when established in August to replace Higher Education Funding Council for Wales.) which is Welsh for “skill” or ability.

This connects with the launch of the launch of the 2018 QAA UK Quality Code which outlines 12 sector-agreed Principles for academic standards, as this has been uniquely designed to apply to all post-secondary providers (to align with changes in Wales and Scotland – as @WONKHE suggest possibly, anticipating a future need in England.

At the other end of our educational pipeline, the HESA data is out, sharing the story of our graduates as freelancers and business starts with “graduates running own business, self-employed/freelancing or developing a portfolio by domicile – Academic years 2017/18 to 2021/22” as well over 21,000  (Figure 8). Have a read of “What do graduates do” which shows, that in government data for broadly the same period, which shows that English graduates were earning £11,500 more a year than non-graduates.  This links to last month’s blog discussions and a King’s College report,  which emphasised the benefit of having a degree, by highlighting the high esteem in which a UK education is held. This month, LEO datas shows from the latest (2021/22) data on graduate earnings and employment that for first degree graduates, median earnings five years after graduation reached £29,900.

All of which helps us understand our students and graduates better – it seems that we can be inspired as research (tomorrow’s entrepreneurs). with entrepreneurs under the age of 35 show that they are more than twice as likely to say their business’ primary aim is to solve a social or environmental problem than older entrepreneurs.

The future is bright – see you at IEEC Belfast 2024 to explore it all in detail!