Education, Employment and the Choice of Career Path Among Young Students in the UK

Education, Employment and the Choice of Career Path Among Young Students in the UK
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Introduction
Education is instrumental in present-day social life as it determines many other affordances, such as a person’s well-being. Employment stands as one of the significant outcomes of education. However, the UK has increasingly registered high youth unemployment rates since 2005 despite the high enrollment into higher education (HE) learning institutions. The most recent rises are attributable to the economic crisis in the country. However, many other confounding effects on unemployment exist, including gender, social class, and disability. Youth unemployment results when young people, which the United Nations defines as 15-24-year-olds, look for jobs but cannot find them (Mercy Corps, 2020). Although unemployment is inherently a problem, youth unemployment is rapidly becoming a global crisis.
Even though access to HE learning institutions in the UK has increased, leading to a dramatic expansion of enrollment into university courses, the youth employment rate remains relatively high compared to the overall unemployment rate in the country. While the employment rate in the UK stands at 4.3%, the youth unemployment rate in 2021 has reached a staggering 11.7% (Stastica, 2021; Office for National Statistics, 2021). Data indicates a weak correlation between HE qualifications and employability and that other factors such as social status, disability, and gender influence youth’s employability (Clements et al., 2011). In this essay, I demonstrate the extent concerning youth’s freedom to decide their future career (mainly in the UK) through critically analyzing the restrictions provided by social class with relevant literature and theories. I will cover three main sections. I will address the first section through the lens of neoliberalism in conjunction with the marketization of education by exploring how individuals have the liberty to determine their future with the skills they acquire from education. The second section will examine how enhancing access to information enables youth to control their future; the third section will criticize the limitations of deciding youth’s employment with social class disparities.
Neoliberalism
Several theorists consider neoliberalism a political and economic ideology, with numerous critiques. In terms of an economic level, in place of Keynesianism, it emphasizes the existence of freedom among citizens and the diminishing state power in the economy (Thorsen and Lie, 2006, p.2). Therefore, in an era of neoliberalism, citizens acquire more freedom regarding choices and decision-making, forcing individuals to take responsibility for gaining control over wealth and power, thereby requiring a greater level of skill. As a result, individuals tend to become “self-interested” (Olssen and Peters, 2005, p.314; Akosah-Twumasi et al., 2018, p.59). They believe that they are experts in rational optimization and can analyze their demands and ambitions. In other words, the number of attempts made by himself solely determines the extent of one’s success. However, as of OECD (2020. p.5), given that young people now enter the career world with little experience given the complexity of the current labor market, practical career guidance is vital to help the students make sense of the world.
Marketization of education in the UK
Modern education serves two roles: to make a life out of education and to make a living and it is indispensable for developing an independent, responsible, and critical attitude towards society and peers among students (Säfström and Mansson, 2021, p.2). Therefore, education of students performs both public and economic roles. The economic role is inclined towards education, making individuals competitive to meet the market economy’s demands. This concept closely relates to individualism, that in society, individuals take the dominant position while society behaves as an impeller that stimulates individuals to achieve prosperity. In this sense, society exists to promote the well-being of an individual (Oyserman and Lee, 2008, p.311). Albeit the pull between making a life and living is not a conspicuous struggle, this tension is evident in debates surrounding the purpose and role of education in society and the constitution of good education in different countries (Säfström and Mansson, 2021, p.3).
In the UK, this marketization reflects the facets of economic liberalism whereby states have to refrain from regulating the economy and leave it to individuals to participate in the free and automated markets. Given that neoliberalism is a modified form of liberalism, it follows that marketization has led to capitalism and improved individual rights (Thorsen and Lie, 2006, p.3). In this sense, the UK youth have had to bear with the high unemployment rates owing to the rapid change that characterizes the current labor market. The structural changes that come with technology, globalization, and shifts in the economic environment have highlighted individual capabilities of acclimatizing to varying circumstances (Riddell and Song, 2011, p. 2). However, youth unemployment in the UK goes beyond the economic factor to embrace other causes such as lack of jobs and lack of employability skills, among many others (Youth Futures Foundation. 2020, p.4). Globalization has affected the education system whereby HE has become a vital driver of the knowledge economy, reflecting neoliberalism, especially regarding freedom of commerce. However, this freedom does not reflect in education, as it does not ensure equity in education attainment. The working class still gets less of everything, including education. As long as the students have different standards and resources regardless of their class and ethnicity, equity in education is a far-fetched eventuality in the UK (Trueman, 2015; Reay, 2017). Society now requires the education system to produce commercially oriented individuals instead of publicly oriented persons (Säfström and Mansson, 2021, p.4). According to Berry (2017), the society is instrumental in influencing young peoples’ career options, and their ensuing development. In this regard, the marketization of education that has brought about individualization and freedom of choice may enable UK youths to make career decisions, but the environments in which these youths reside restrain their freedom in choosing their careers. Young people may be entitled to make their own decisions, but they must be flexible. Reflexivity in decision-making is advantageous for youth in negotiating future risks (Laughland-Booÿ et al., 2014, p.4). Therefore, the socialization of young people plays an important part in these negotiations. According to the agency theory, individuals make decisions depending on their ideas, beliefs, and experiences (Berry, 2017). This reliance on ideas and beliefs insinuates that sociological contexts influence the youth’s decisions. It is noteworthy that sociological factors play a significant role in developing youth’s identity and career.
The role of marketing plans in selling HE institutions
Private costs and disparities between resources and education achievement in different UK HE institutions is a significant feature of the contemporary education system. The role has been growing since the decision of the government to open up the education system to free market trading (Oplatka and Hemsley-Brown, 2010, p.2). Moreover, it is evident in the increasing competition between institutions and the activity surplus between corporates and learning institutions. Marketing and business plans feature prominently in this discourse, and widening participation and social segmentation have arisen. Statistics show that 611,390 students enrolled as the university’s first-year students in 2019/20, while there were 518,090 enrollments during the 2010/11 (HESA, 2021). Most students enrolled for first-degree courses as those enrolling for undergraduate courses continue to record a 6% decline each year since 2017/2018.
Moreover, first graduate courses recorded a marked increase in first-year students, with most non-European Union students enrolling (HESA, 2021). However, the transition rates to employment have remained relatively low, with the youths between the ages of 16 and 17 posting the highest ever unemployment rate of 35.5% in May 2021 since 2014 (HESA, 2021). Although freedom of choice in the new market means increased competition, OECD (2020, P.3) states that the current economic environment allows young people to apply their skills and knowledge in an unfamiliar situation, thus challenging them to be personally effective. In this light, young people achieve a break in their quest to challenge the constraints that gender and class bring about. This aspect of competition then requires that students make the right decisions regarding their career paths. Thus, besides autonomy, some guidance from experts is worth especially for the less privileged. Neoliberalism and freedom of choice of career
The rising significance of HE in the economy has seen many governments promote entrepreneurial skills and develop new performance measures that establish and enhance the achievement of targets. The student is thus required to be a self-interested individual, and thus they should be capable of rational thought and be the best judge of their interests and needs (Olssen and Peters, 2005, 315). Moreover, the systems now prefer to allocate opportunities and resources through the market, which has become an efficient and morally superior mechanism. In this sense, individualism takes center stage in the current neoliberal learning environment. Therefore, the individual agency can be a fundamental factor affecting youth’s freedom regarding deciding their career destination. According to Alkire (2008, p.2), agency denotes an individual’s ability to conform to moral values. Thus, it could be derived at the level of an individual’s ambitions on the agency as it correlates positively to their value. According to Billet (2006, p.56), the interdependency between social and individual agency allows for a negotiated learning process. Still, it emphasizes the uniqueness of the individual in making sense of the world and carrying out reproduction.
Individualization and learnification in the education system
Individual freedom is essential in enabling students to make their own out of what they encounter from the social world, which is an attribute without which the desired change process cannot occur. In the present knowledge economy that blends with the dynamics of a free-market economy, it is incumbent upon the students to go with the rapid changes that come with the current labor market. This knowledge follows the realization that formal school positively influences an individual’s adaptability to rapidly changing circumstances (Riddell and Song, 2011, 3). In the early days, much of human capital theory regarded schooling as a mechanism that would enhance an individual ability to make efficient decisions in light of changing circumstances (Olssen and Peters, 2005). According to Alkire (2008, p. 3), individuals primed for success have goals aligned with their well-being. Moreover, the person should have the adequate power to achieve their chosen results. For that reason, given the individualization, that...