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Planet Ivy
:The Harsh Reality of Life as a Graduate
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William Davie
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Mark Wilkinson
:Is Britain Being Starved of Vital Skills?
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Hilary Aked
:Student Rights Group Claims Media 'Mistakes', Conflation with Extremism 'Not the Fault' of its Gender Segregation Report
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Octavia Sheepshanks
:Man-Hating Feminism More Than Just A Myth
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If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
If you have something to say...
Say it on the Huffington Post
As a nation, we are inherently afraid of failure, while in America, people are encouraged to take risks. This is the nature of an entrepreneur, a fearless, ambitious and passionate risk taker, and I believe that we need to create more people of this nature to think big and be ambitious.
Young people today have a far greater range of educational choices than ever before and, thanks to the technological revolution, numerous ways of accessing them. What these latest statistics show, when studied in context, is that these options are no longer going unnoticed.
The government is rightly focussed on creating the next Google but for graduates as a whole to succeed, and to have a generation that thrives, what is needed is a broader focus to create a whole entrepreneurial generation not just a technological few.
The reality for the majority of graduates this year is that their average starting salary will be about £20,000 - lower outside London. Most new graduates will get jobs, and will not get them on large graduate training schemes, but with small businesses and local firms.
Other pesky issues tacked on the blog this week included the imminent scrap over the new National Curriculum, due to be published any day, and the chief inspector Sir Michael Wilshaw's stringent views on the state sector failing its brightest pupils.
As I continue my voyage into discovering just why so many of my generation are still unemployed, I continue to look for ways to remedy this. 264,000 young people - meaning those under the age of 24 - are long term unemployed.
With an economy on life-support and no sign of recovery any time soon, we need to learn the lessons of the new ways of innovating which are emerging there - and central to this will be equipping graduates with the skills for a 21st century economy, not that of last century.
I knew nothing about private universities before I started considering my options for higher education - in fact I didn't even know they existed. But deciding to study at LCA Business School right in the heart of central London, has been one of the best decisions I've ever made.
This had not been the plan. The initial idea had been to further my knowledge in film, perhaps through a gentle foundation course. Not a part-time MA in World Cinema. How difficult could studying really be? Extremely, is the short answer.
I'm the first to admit to being a complete social media addict, and I'm starting to worry that my seemingly obsessive dependence on social networks is going to do a lot more harm than good in the long run.
Many hold the view that a research informed curriculum is not essential, and would seek to decouple the research and teaching agendas. However, it is clear that if students engage in research informed teaching then they develop many of the skills required by employers.
Can Britain's two most prominent educational establishments can be said to have failed the country?
Granted, 'Spotted' is just a Facebook page set up by university students for university students but what it reveals should sound alarm bells. If we allow comments such as these to go unnoticed at this level what message does that send?
In short, the school will become an unhappy place for all but a few who enjoy the rough and tumble - but these do not sound like desirable qualities in an educator. Any sense of working together to create a sound institution in which each and everyone can take a pride will disappear.
The protesters just don't fancy having Julian welcomed by their Union. He can do what he wants elsewhere, just not in our backyard, okay? In this sense, the argument boils down to a folksy, everyday problem. Would you want Julian Assange round for dinner?
This is a measure that at best will be a waste of time, a precious resource in teaching, and could well lower the quality of teaching. I can't imagine a headteacher who values the cohesion of his staff and their goodwill wanting anything to do with this.
