British Academy response to Universities UK report

In response to Universities UK’s report, Solving future skills challenges, Professor Sir Ian Diamond, Chair of the British Academy Skills Programme said:

“The British Academy welcomes this report’s underlining of the importance of the humanities and social science to the nation’s future.

“We echo UUK’s concerns about falling numbers of mature and part-time students; the Industrial Strategy calls for a highly skilled, flexible, workforce, and this will require high-quality, flexible and lifelong learning.

“We urge the Government to explore how to address this decline and promote lifelong learning. In addition, any changes to the funding and regulatory regime should strive to safeguard strategically important but vulnerable subjects like languages that are vital to Britain’s success in the world post-Brexit.

“Graduates of the arts, humanities and social sciences are vital to our nation’s economy and culture; the service sector, fuelled by the skills and knowledge of these graduates, makes up 80% of our economy.

“The next decades will see major technological, geopolitical and socio-economic transformations in the way we work and live. In a world where the only constant is change, flexible, lifelong learners are what we need.”

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For more information, please contact [email protected] or on 0207 969 5273

For more information about UUK's report, Solving future skills challenges, please contact [email protected]

Read the British Academy’s report The Right Skills: Celebrating Skills in the Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences(published November 2017)