EUKN - European Urban Knowledge Network - Growing by degrees? High skilled workers in Liverpool

Growing by degrees? High skilled workers in Liverpool

Introduction

Liverpool is part of the Centre for Cities’ Partner City research programme. The programme works closely with a small group of cities to inform economic development strategies and improve economic performance. A city’s stock of high skilled workers is one of the key determinants of its economic performance. This report focuses on high skilled workers in Liverpool. It answers two questions:

How can Liverpool attract and retain more graduates?
What more can partners in Liverpool do to ensure that its graduates meet the needs of priority business sectors?

Description

The report argues that Liverpool should steer clear of introducing new
targets and interventions aimed at attracting and retaining graduates.
Cities have little direct influence over flows of graduates around the country because these are determined primarily by relative levels of demand for high skilled workers. Instead of focusing on graduate attraction and retention, partners – including local authorities, universities and other agencies - should concentrate on increasing the supply of home-grown talent and helping boost demand for high skilled workers among local businesses.

Liverpool is already narrowing the skills gap between itself and England’s other Core Cities. Between 1995 and 2008, the share of its adults qualified to degree level rose from 13.8 percent to 23.4 percent and the distance by which it lags the Core Cities average fell from 3.5 to 2.3 percentage points. By 2020 Liverpool should aim to have closed this gap altogether.

Partners should also be wary of trying to tailor university courses too closely to the specific needs of the business community. Our research suggests that, for the most part, businesses want graduates with strong core competencies and employability skills. These should remain top priorities for Liverpool’s universities, and the focus on employability skills should continue to be increased.

Good work is already going on in this area, particularly in the shape of
Liverpool John Moores University’s World of Work programme. Local
government partners should support efforts like this by helping to improve awareness and engagement from the business community.

Conclusions

Drop plans to introduce a graduate retention target and stay focused on increasing the share of the city region’s adult population educated to degree level;
Strengthen educational attainment in schools – particularly in maths and English - to improve the supply of local talent;
Use Liverpool’s Knowledge Economy Group to design and coordinate policies that help boost demand for high skilled workers across the city region;
Support the focus on employability skills at Liverpool universities by improving business awareness of existing programmes;
Redesign computer games courses to gain industry accreditation and strengthen practical skills training on science courses.

Publication date

03/11/2009

Download the Growing by degrees? report (Eng Pdf 2104Kb)

Document type

research

Themes

Urban Policy

Keywords

Economy knowledge & employment