What do people from Wales study?
8 February 2024
Owain James
So I often discuss WHERE people from Wales study, but I think it’s just as important to consider WHAT they are studying. After all, for many employers, with the increasing emphasis on ‘skills’, the subjects that people study (and the content and skills they learn on their course) is perhaps more important than where they studied.
These are the 10 most popular courses that people from Wales are studying across the UK (for those who enrolled in 2021/22):
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Are you surprised? Thinking about current and emerging skill gaps in the Welsh economy, what do you think should feature in the top 10 courses?
You can find more data on the what people are studying at university in the UK here if you want to do some further digging.
Unfortunately, HESA doesn’t give the option to segment this data by university AND domicile, and we can’t get a clear picture of what Welsh students outside of Wales are studying. It would be good to know this because, ultimately, as much as we want to attract grads to Wales, we shouldn’t be doing this just for the sake of it.
I say this because the ‘brain drain’ and skill shortages are two interlinked but separate issues that Wales is facing.
In theory, we could ‘solve’ the brain drain by attracting more graduates into Wales than the amount that leave. However, if these graduates stay or return to Wales but work in low skilled roles, leaving wider skills gaps in the economy unfilled, the problem of ‘skills shortages’ would remain. You might have hit the mark by bringing these grads to Wales, but missed the point entirely.
