British Kids Are Skipping Top Colleges for White-Collar Apprenticeships
Rumaysah Khan was offered a place to study at the University of Oxford. She turned it down and went to work as an apprentice at a law firm instead.
The college route would have given her a prestigious degree, but also mounds of student debt and little to no practical experience—a dangerous position in a legal industry rushing to adopt AI productivity tools.
“I knew from an early age I wanted to do law and that this route would fast track me into the career,” said London-based Khan.
College grads on both sides of the Atlantic are facing a challenging start to their careers, with job candidates finding themselves competing with AI for entry-level positions. For a large cohort of British high-school graduates, college no longer feels like a good deal.
Now, a growing number of white-collar apprenticeship programs are offering high-school leavers another route into industries such as consulting, finance and law—fields typically reserved for college graduates.
