The Class of STEM

I recently wrote an article about various Government and industry initiatives in the UK to recruit more engineers to build our brave new world of net zero.  It’s an important subject, as it’s one of the few things that everyone agrees on.  It’s very clear that we don’t have enough engineers in the workforce; but we don’t seem to have any credible plan to increase the numbers in the short term.

What was interesting was the discussion that followed that article, which suggested that the class system still has a surprising hold on engineering status, particularly here in Britain.  It reminded me of the famous Frost Report “Class” sketch from 1966. 

If you’ve never seen the Frost Show sketch, you’ve missed a great classic of comedy.  Click here to correct that omission, or to remind yourself of how good it is.

Revisiting rhat sketch from a current STEM point of view, I think it would go something like this:

Entrepreneur:  I look down on him because I run a global tech empire.

Engineer:  I look up to him (Entrepreneur), because he is worth billions; but I look down on him (Plumber) because I have two degrees.

Plumber:  I know my place.  I look up to them both.  But I don’t look up to him (Engineer) as much as I look up to him (Entrepreneur), because he has a super yacht and a private jet.

Entrepreneur:  I have success, but I didn’t finish my degree.  So sometimes I look up to him (Engineer).

Engineer:  I still look up to him (Entrepreneur), because although I have two degrees, they’ve not given me job security.  But I still look down at him (Plumber), even though I need him to mend my boiler.

Plumber:  I know my place.  I look up to them both.  Although I have no student loan or private jet, they still need to pay me to make their lives work.  Had I the inclination, I could look down on them. But I don’t.

Engineer:  We all know our place, but what do we get out of it?

Entrepreneur: I get a feeling of superiority over them.

Engineer:  I get a feeling of inferiority from him, (Entrepreneur), but a feeling of superiority over him (Plumber).

Plumber:  I get a warm feeling from knowing they’re sitting in the cold when their boiler packs up.  Especially when my phone’s on silent.

(For US readers, boiler = furnace.)

The serious point about this is that engineering, particularly in the UK, is still a profession that’s not quite sure what it is.  It lacks the status that it has in many other countries, with the name applied to everything from nuclear design to fixing the drains, with surprisingly little discrimination in the public’s mind.  We have learned institutes that try to elevate their membership with the moniker of Chartered Engineer, but that’s a distinction largely lost outside those paying the fee for using the extra initials.  It’s unlikely that anyone who isn’t a Chartered Engineer would know what they mean.

Without a clear public view of what engineering is, it’s difficult to promote it as a career.  Far too often, STEM seems to be a tickbox for the education industry, which fails to convince parents that engineering is a worthwhile choice for their children.  Instead, we see parental pressure pushing the academically inclined towards law and medicine, although that’s no longer where the jobs are likely to be.  There’s limited encouragement for anything to do with technology or engineering, despite the advantages they offer.  It’s also rare to hear about the passion of engineering, or the pleasure that you get from being part of a creative technical process that makes things.

I volunteer at a Fixing Factory, where we invite people to bring in household products that have broken, which they would like fixed.  It helps keep those products out of landfill (and we need more legislation to stop companies making unrepairable products), but it also gives people joy to see some of their favourite items brought back to life.  My fellow fixers come from all backgrounds.  Some have engineering qualifications, some went through apprenticeships, and others just like taking things to pieces to see how they work.  Most of us were allowed to play with screwdrivers when we were kids and have never looked back.  But we all share a passion for finding out how things work and fixing them.

Excitement is important and we don’t seem to do it in education any more.  When I’m working in the Fixing Factory we often get parents bringing their children to watch something being repaired.  We try to explain what we’re doing, why it broke and how it works.  Almost all are interested.  At the end, I usually ask them if that was more fun than school and I’ve yet to hear anything other than an enthusiastic “Yes!”.  I remember being excited by stuff at school, but it feels that it’s been lost in today’s curriculum.

It’s that passion which makes engineering such a great career, and that’s what we need to encourage.  Some of the best engineers I’ve ever employed left school early because they wanted to make things.  They learnt by following their passion.  That’s repeated at the top of the chain, where tech leaders from Alan Sugar to Bill Gates, Steve Jobs to Sam Altman and Mark Zuckerburg to Michael Dell left school early or failed to finish their degrees.  They just went out and used that passion to make something happen, leading to the creation of major new companies.  Our politicians love them, holding them up as examples of what we need to make our Country great.  But they don’t seem to be so keen on promoting their approach of walking away from the education system.  That attitude has seen a steady erosion of vocational learning in favour of education, education and education.  But that looks as if it is about to change.

Introducing VAT for Post 16 education

The current Government has imposed VAT (Valued Added Taxation) on private education.  Now, there is a new proposal for Vocational or V levels.  It’s a rather nice irony, that they’re applying VAT (Vocational Levels, Academic Levels and Technical Levels) to post 16 education.  I imagine that someone is smugly chuckling at that in the Department for Education, as they wonder how long it will be before a Minister spots it. 

The new V Level proposals are out for consultation until 12^th January 2026.  Whatever your career path has been in engineering, if you’ve enjoyed where it’s taken you, have a look at these Post-16 Level 3 and Below Pathways proposals and add your views. 

There’s a lot of good ideas in the proposal, but it’s an initiative which is heavily constrained by the need to tick boxes and grade results.  It’s heavy on civil-service and education speak, which makes some of it fairly impenetrable.  For instance, V levels will be 360 GLH.  Who knows what that means?  According to Acronym Finder it’s Good Looking Hair.  What is disappointing is the lack of mention of engineering or technology, although multiple reports highlight the need to attract more people into these areas.  (It does mention hairdressing, so perhaps the GLH reference is appropriate.)

It’s also concerning that they propose having no awarding organisation for V Levels, apparently “to make the qualifications easier to understand”.  Over the years I’ve found most people who want to employ bright young people have little idea of what any qualification means, as they change so frequently.  Which puts the emphasis on experience and references, raising the question of whether it would be better to concentrate on apprenticeships.

Despite that, V levels look like a move in the right direction, so please go and give your views on the consultation.  However, if we haven’t given kids a passion for learning or doing stuff a lot earlier in their lives, they may just be a sticking plaster on a problem which has already happened.    We really need to try harder.  And we need to make STEM far more compelling for parents and teachers.  Unless they believe in it, we will have lost the next generation of engineers before they get to 16.  And those children will have lost a wonderful opportunity.