Higher education and the world of work: What’s the evidence behind educational policies?

The relationship between higher education and the world of work remains a critical policy issue amid an increasing number of unemployed graduates in many countries. This topic – exploring the intersection between higher education and employment – was also the focus of the third IIEP Strategic Debate, held on 3 June 2015.

The event featured Professor Ulrich Teichler, the former Director of the International Centre for Higher Education Research of the University of Kassel, Germany, and a renowned international expert, as the principal speaker. Teichler critically examined some of the major narratives on this subject. While these narratives have helped shape educational policies over the past 50 years, they are often contradictory in their conclusions and can misguide educational policy and investment decisions.

Teichler first discussed the “expansion” narrative, which is based on a strong correlation between higher education development and economic growth. Under this logic, countries with relatively low enrolment rates would be expected to  trail in economic development and are thus urged to invest in higher education.

The debate also delved into the narrative of so-called “over-education and skills mismatch”, which is based on the study of higher education development and associated unemployment or underemployment. This premise can be criticized for adopting a somewhat narrow and rigid definition of underemployment. In many countries, the nature of work is changing rapidly and jobs formerly occupied by vocationally trained persons are held today by higher education graduates. In addition, skills needed for a particular post are constantly evolving, and higher education should thus prepare graduates to be “trainable on the job”. 

Teichler  stressed that educational policies geared towards strengthening the placement of higher education graduates in the labour market  requires  a more nuanced understanding, which can be best provided by an analysis generated from graduate surveys. Teichler presented comparative findings from such surveys, which illustrated distinct job-seeking patterns across countries and different levels or methods of university support. Comparative findings generated from tracer studies also revealed diverse appreciations of graduates on whether their fields of study adequately prepared them for their job. These findings demonstrate that existing understandings on the right balance of competencies to be acquired in a particular higher education system are culturally determined and relate considerably to the perceived role of higher education in preparing graduates for the labour market.

Paul Coustère, IIEP Deputy Director, also took to the floor to emphasize that growing youth populations (15–24 years old) in many developing countries will only exacerbate graduate unemployment in the future, making investment decisions in the education sector all the more important. However, there will always be tradeoffs with regard to an appropriate allocation of public resources by education level. From an economic perspective, Coustère said measurement tools should include social and private rates of returns analysis on the investment of education. The social returns are a key reason for public finance, but they do neglect larger societal impacts, such as those relating for instance to health, citizenship, etc that are harder to quantify.

The discussion also explored innovative ways to strengthen the professional character of higher education programmes while developing general competencies of students, especially in scenarios where future training needs might still be unknown. This could include project-based learning to help lay the foundation for both adaptability and professional readiness once graduates enter the work force.