Prof Shitij Kapur says there are too many graduates and degree is now just a ‘visa’ to enter professional world
The UK now has a “surfeit” of graduates and students must accept that a university degree is no longer a “passport to social mobility”, a leading vice-chancellor has argued.
Prof Shitij Kapur, the head of King’s College London, said the days when universities could promise that their graduates were certain to get good jobs are over, in an era where nearly half the population enters higher education.
Kapur said a university degree is now more like a “visa” than a guaranteed route to professional success, a reflection of the shrinking graduate pay premium and the increased competition from AI and other graduates from around the world.
“The competition for graduate jobs is not just all because of AI filling out forms or taking away jobs. It’s also because of the stalling of our economy and it’s also because of a surfeit of graduates. So I feel that that simple promise [of a good job] has now become conditional on ‘Which university did you go to? What course did you take?’” Kapur said.
