OK, it's not football related, but I feel that so many of this country's' ills' stem from the fact that not enough young people have the skills to be able to fill the vacancies. Some want instant fame and fortune via 'X Factor' or similar and others want to make their mark developing the latest smartphone app. This is a story of a girl who was told by a teacher - "She would never amount to anything," and admits to being quite disruptive as a child. Read the full story here - http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/education-27922770
I can say from experience, having just finished an Engineering Degree that the ratio of me to women in engineering is skewed massively towards males at pretty much every level. Educationally theres nothing that is see that particularly explains the lack of women in this area, generally girls don't do Physics at school which seem to be almost a cultural quirk, Physics is not harder or less interesting that Chemistry or Biology both of which are roughly 50/50 boys and girls. There is also a feeling that and Engineering Degree is all about cars, planes, racing, big machines etc. to be honest this just isn't true, mostly you learn more maths, physics, problem solving and design. None of this should be the domain of males. I know several girls who were doing other science courses who saw what we did and founded it interesting despite admitting they would have never thought about doing it themselves when they applied. I would say that there is something of a "Ladish culture" in some engineering work places, mostly this is due though to the fact that there are no women around in the factories, in a factory I visited in Sweden there was a far more balanced ratio of men a women working the machines which actually gave the place a more pleasant working enviorment and after a few hours didn't seem odd at all, felt very natural. It is very much true that there is a shortage of engineers in this country, having just gone through getting jobs with my course mates we all found it fairly easy and the number of engineering opportunities is vast, there is a lot of growth in the area and as such there will be even more jobs in future, one of the reasons i feel that there is such a shortage is that only about 50% of the people who would be good at it consider it as a profession. We are losing the battle in GCSE years really girls just not seem to be engaged with physics, and to a lesser extent math, during their GCSEs which means they a less inclined to take it at A-level. It's a really important thing to get right and currently we're not doing enough.
I'd also add, at risk of debating with myself, that your example JR of app development as a distraction form better permutes is very wrong, coding is an extremely useful tool and one i only really learnt in my last 2 years at uni (i spent a long time at uni) i wish i had learned to code at school and the more students we can bring through who want to be able to design software the better, its another industry that is perfect for the UK to set itself apart in a modern high tech economy. I do fundamentally agree though that we need more vocational education for students who are likely not to end their schooling with any qualifications a trade, (or grounding in multiple trades) would be a very useful thing to getting a job or apprenticeship. A lot of what i was talking about above is obviously university educated engineers as its what I know about but the premise is true across the different spectra of ability and education.
Really appreciate your reply Bath -especially as you're in that particular profession. It would be fantastic if more pupils could be encouraged to take subjects such as physics and maths, but some would rather opt for the 'easier' subjects and so lessen their chances of finding well paid employment in future.
whilst for many that is true there are several hard degrees which attract girls the same as boys and I don't think the girl who could do engineering but don't are opting for easier things, they're largely doing other hard science based degrees, Chemistry, Pharmacology and medicine being the big ones. Sounds strange to say but far too many intelligent people become determined to be doctors because they like the idea of the status, the idea that there want people to think "wow he/she must be clever if they're a doctor". One thing that I think would help in engineering would be protecting the job title 'Engineer" to be only people who hold a degree or comparable experience like several other professions are. there are far to many "gas engineers" or "washing machine engineers" that the term gets devalued to an extent and so the title lacks a satus that demonstrates that you've spent, most likely, 5 years in further education.
Incredibly proud! He will be only the second member of my family to get to university and Loughborough will be an amazing experience for him.
I'm recently retired, but used to work in IT. I get quite concerned at how we regularly hear that businesses are having trouble recruiting staff with the right skills.
