High-quality technical training routes should be included in college performance measures, according to a new report.

This should be guaranteed by the governments across the UK, the Institute of Mechanical Engineers (IMechE) recommends in its new report, Big Ideas: the future of engineering in schools. It also calls on the Royal Academy of Engineering and professional engineering institutions to push for a broader curriculum to age 18 to be implemented within the next 10 years as “the main way to improve gender balance and to increase interest in technical training”.

“At the heart of this vision lies the need to enhance engineering and technological literacy for all,” states the report. “We need to make structural changes that will enable us to promote engineering as people-focused, problem-solving and socially beneficial. We also need to emphasise how the objects that define our world are developed and manufactured. Through this, both the economic and social value of engineering can be made manifest in ways that they are currently not.”

Janet Clark, education policy adviser at the ATL teaching union, said the report highlighted the problem of a narrow academic curriculum, exacerbated by the government’s education reforms. She argued that this did not allow opportunities for the practical, real-life application of knowledge learned in the classroom.  

“However, there are other problems associated with a lack of young people entering the engineering profession, including a shortage of physics teachers,”  she added. “In addition, cuts to further education budgets of 35 per cent over the past five years have inevitably put at risk the pipeline of young people working towards engineering careers in vocational settings.”  

Want to keep up with the latest education news and opinion? Follow TES FE News on Twitter and like TES FE News on Facebook