As the lively debate over the future direction of apprenticeships continues, we’re pleased to welcome a guest article from Professor Claire Pike, Pro Vice-Chancellor of Anglia Ruskin University, to mark National Apprenticeship Week.
Degree apprenticeships continue to grow – both in absolute numbers of apprentices, and the proportion of apprentices who are studying at degree level. The latest data show growth of 8% year-on-year in starts at Levels 4-7, and based on UCAS acceptance data we can estimate that roughly 5% of those beginning a degree last year were doing so in combination with an apprenticeship.
Opportunities
Anglia Ruskin University (ARU) – based in Cambridge, Chelmsford, Peterborough and London – currently serves around 3500 apprentices; approximately 10% of our student population. For us, a clear benefit of degree apprenticeships is the opportunity to work closely with employers directly to meet sector skills and talent needs. Course development is demand-led and our course portfolio is shaped directly by the input of employers – both in terms of the subjects offered, and the design of the courses themselves. Agility and responsiveness in course design, validation and launch are key.
ARU’s Laboratory Scientist degree apprenticeship, launched in September 2023, provides a clear example of this design process in practice. Cambridge is rightly world-famous for scientific innovation; indeed, the University of Cambridge’s Laboratory of Molecular Biology, alone, has given rise to 12 Nobel Prizes to date. However, the Life Sciences sector in the region reports a sustained skills and talent shortfall, particularly in technical and laboratory management roles, which is only set to increase as the sector further grows. ARU has developed the Laboratory Scientist degree apprenticeship as a direct response to this need, engaging large employers, such as AstraZeneca, and exemplary small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in its conceptualisation.
From the perspective of an HEI, positive collaboration on degree apprenticeships can be the start of a broader, deeper and multi-faceted employer relationship. From the perspective of an employer struggling with skills and talent gaps, investing in apprenticeships can be a sustainable way to solve these problems; apprentices tend to stay with their employer long-term after graduation, typically holding the mindset that they are ‘of’ and ‘for’ their local geographical region, and displaying loyalty toward the organisation that invested in their training.
Taking a systems approach to talent and skills needs, degree apprenticeships also provide mutually attractive articulation opportunities with FE providers. For example, ARU is working in partnership with United Learning’s Cambridge Academy for Science and Technology (CAST) to promote to employers and learners the potential progression opportunity from CAST’s T Level in Laboratory Sciences to ARU’s Laboratory Scientist degree apprenticeship. From an employer perspective, the 12-week T Level work placement provides a chance to assess potential apprentices within their workplace and make employment offers to those who inspire confidence.
As rightly outlined in the Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) report on the role of apprenticeship intermediaries in England, the landscape of education and skills provision within a region is often highly complex and challenging to navigate for learners and employers – especially SMEs who may have the will to engage in training the next generation of talent for their industry, but rarely the administrative machinery confidently to support this. The ARU-CAST employer-facing agreement described above is one small example of the positive interlinkages that are possible; a joined-up model of clear, systemised signposting and brokerage is a tantalising aspiration. The role that universities might play as convening forces in their regions can and should be further explored.
The question of whether degree apprenticeships are widening access to higher education continues to be controversial. As articulated by the Sutton Trust, young people from disadvantaged backgrounds make up only a modest percentages of degree apprenticeship starters, and these percentages are not higher than those from similar backgrounds commencing university degree courses. At the same, and quite rightly, parity of esteem between apprenticeships and traditional university courses is desired by government and HEIs, and increasingly becoming realised – so, in a tricky Möbius strip of esteem and attraction, degree apprenticeships with good reputations receive increasing numbers of applications from demographics who have traditionally found it easier to access opportunities. Through outreach activities and the development of FE and employer interlinkages, universities must continue to play a central role in ensuring that apprenticeships are fully inclusive in their approach and intakes.
I would also contend that attracting ‘young’ learners is only one aspect of the value that degree apprenticeships can confer. As we ready ourselves for the introduction of the Lifelong Learning Entitlement in 2026/27, now, as much as ever, is a time to be open-minded about the value of people accessing education at all ages and stages of their lives – including career development and scaffolded progression opportunities for existing trusted employees.
Challenges and their potential solutions
Many of the challenges experienced by HEIs with respect to degree apprenticeships can be summarised as scalability concerns.
Apprenticeship occupational standards now number over 800, of which around 200 are at degree level. The direction of travel has been increasingly toward a greater number of highly specific standards – which creates the intrinsic challenge of whether an HEI can recruit enough apprentices per course to reach a break-even point in delivering the necessary education.
Imagine, then, if the standards were re-conceptualised to deliver broader occupational competencies, rather than being aligned to specific role titles – so we would have fewer, but broader standards, serving complementary roles from a given industry. This idea could facilitate learning that is more flexible, transferrable and ‘future proof’ for apprentices’ personal development and careers – surely a benefit within sectors that are fast-moving in terms of their technical developments.
High-quality degree apprenticeship delivery is resource intense. Universities delivering significant volumes of apprenticeships have invested in suites of new roles to: conduct tripartite progress review meetings; administrate the operations, transactions and compliance aspects of apprenticeships; and try to manage the important but arguably unglamourous task of melding the necessary infrastructure for apprenticeships with underlying university systems that serve all students. There is also delicate culture-change piece sometimes required with employers who traditionally have sponsored employees’ degrees on a day-release model – sending their staff to university with a ‘black box’, knowledge-in, qualification-out expectation – to plan and make explicit the intricate and mutually reinforcing interplay of on-the-job and off-the-job learning that is a feature of degree apprenticeships, and the necessary depth and frequency of employer contribution to and engagement with this.
The regulatory system within which HEIs operate when delivering degree apprenticeships is one significant driver of resource use. The dissolution of IfATE and the ESFA could be a welcome opportunity to simplify regulation – but with Skills England, the OfS and Ofsted all playing some role in the regulation of degree apprenticeships, and all requiring distinct responses within independent and potentially overlapping timeframes, the current picture is still unlikely one we would choose to design from scratch. Effective regulatory reform, together with a repositioning of quality assurance/enhancement approach to feel more in-keeping with the discursive, peer-review-based culture of HE, would surely tempt more HEIs on board.
The degree apprenticeship agenda is multi-faceted and exciting, bursting with chances to work in partnerships that can mobilise forward-thinking universities to make a direct contribution to productivity and economic growth. Brave systems developments and changes will help these opportunities to take flight.