‘If I get a good job you could say that it was worthwhile’: students’ views on higher education as a risk investment

Abstract

Students’ choices in higher education occupy a wide spectrum in recent academic and policy discussions. However, there has been little research on how government discourses on the knowledge-based economy shape, transform or influence students’ choices at a micro-level. This paper uses a governmentality framework to link the ways in which the ‘conduct of conduct’ operates through the episteme, techne and ethos of government. The paper presents findings from a large-scale survey in three major higher education institutions in Ireland, together with the thematic analysis of students’ comments on an open-ended question. The findings show that students invest heavily in more advanced HE qualification in order to perform well in the competition for jobs. However, the study also demonstrates that students are aware of the limitations in this human capital framework but not due to them making bad choices but to the lack of control individuals have in affecting the labour market.

Keywords:

• Ireland
• higher education
• student choices
• knowledge-based economy

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

1 This study was cross-sectional rather than longitudinal like the HECSU and CIRP, therefore while the questionnaire drew on these survey instruments, it comprised a once-off survey rather than capturing how the experience changed over time.

2 Ireland has 21 main publicly-funded tertiary education institutions; seven of them are universities and fourteen of them are institutes of technologies (together with some small teacher training institutions). The higher education sector in Ireland, often referred to as the ‘third level sector’, is relatively small encompassing some 193,187 (full and part time) students (2010/11 data). There are also many privately-funded tertiary education institutions.

3 EUROSTUDENTSURVEY III Report on the Social and Living Conditions of Higher Education Students in Ireland 2006/2007.

4 EUROSTUDENT SURVEY IV Report on the Social and Living Conditions of Higher Education Students in Ireland 2009/2010.

5 All students names used in this paper are pseudonyms.

6 The Leaving Certificate is the final public examination at the end of second-level education. For almost all students, selection for higher education is based on grades obtained in six Leaving Certificate subjects on a competitive basis.

7 Grinds is a Hiberno-English term which is used to refer to usually private lessons outside school hours.

8 See for example http://www.instituteofeducation.ie/higher-level-maths-grinds-2/.

9 The Higher Education and Training Awards Council, the legal successor to the National Council for Educational Awards, granted higher education awards in Ireland beyond the university system from 2001 to 2012.

10 This study found that that 41.6% of full-time students are working between 9 and 16 hours per week and a further 19.7% are working between 17 and 24 hours per week. On the other hand, 16.6% of part-time students are working between 25 and 35 hours and 71.8% are working more than 35 hours each week. Just 4% of full-time students worked more than 35 hours per week.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Luciana Lolich

Luciana Lolich is currently working as a post-doctoral fellow at the School of Social Work and Social Policy in TCD as part of the SoCaTel co-creation project Horizon 2020, which seeks to respond to the needs of the growing ageing populations in Europe with the help of ICT. She has over 10 years’ experience in teaching at postgraduate and undergraduate level on the areas of critical marketing, digital technologies and consumer choice in health and education.