Young Australians’ appetite for education has plunged in recent years, raising questions about the federal government’s ambitions for a more qualified populace.
An analysis of multiple data sets has uncovered a decline in school leavers’ demand for higher education, particularly among young women – the primary driver of growth in Australian university enrolments since the 1980s. Just 38 per cent entered university last year, down from 52 per cent in 2017, pushing female commencement rates back to levels last seen a decade and a half ago.
Young men’s demand for degrees has fallen by over 10 percentage points since peaking at 41 per cent in 2021. And the decline is unlikely to be arrested by a future influx of school leavers, with school completion rates about three percentage points below their 2017 peak.
The analysis, by the Mackenzie Research Institute, shows that stalling demand for degrees is not being offset by a reinvigoration of vocational education. The figures reveal 15 years of “steady decline” in commencement rates in publicly funded training, notwithstanding “considerable variability” – particularly during the Covid-19 pandemic – and a post-pandemic bump in young men’s take-up of apprenticeships.
