When Andy Burnham set out his vision for the Manchester Baccalaureate on a recent episode of the Our Kids in the North podcast, it was difficult to disagree with the ambition. Elevating technical education to the same status as academic qualifications could transform opportunities for the two thirds of young people in Greater Manchester who don’t go to university.
Too many young people risk being left behind, particularly in the North, where they are twice as likely to leave school without five good GCSEs compared to their London peers. While the Government’s looks to reform welfare for those under 22, reinvesting savings into work and training opportunities, this doesn’t go far enough in treating the cause, and not the symptom, of poor social mobility. We still have a system that fails to connect those from disadvantaged backgrounds with real opportunities that help to raise aspirations and improve future outcomes.
The MBacc offers a real opportunity to shift the trajectories of disadvantaged young people, but only if private sector businesses buy in from the start. Organisations like Ahead Partnership help to facilitate this collaboration – connecting the private and public sector with educators to bridge the gap between education and industry and drive real impact.
While many businesses do already engage with schools, this is too often in an ad-hoc, reactive way due to limited capacity. To truly prepare young people for the workplace, engagement needs to be deeper and more strategic than a one-off careers fair or workplace visit. This means working with employers to co-design skills programmes that not only align with current industry needs but also anticipate future skills gaps.
Consistency and targeted engagement are key for unlocking social value at its fullest. By providing young people with meaningful and longer-term work placements, programmes and opportunities – we give them the opportunity to develop an evolving sector knowledge, which can adapt with shifting policy and economic landscapes.
This is equally impactful when engaging with priority sectors and developments within a young person’s local region. Take the plans around Old Trafford or the new hospitals programme cross West Yorkshire, Manchester and Durham as an example: involving young people in a development lifecycle can open them to sectors, knowledge and experiences which extend far beyond that which can be taught in the classroom. By the time that development is complete, equally so is a talent pipeline with a strong understanding of the roles required to take forward different sectors, and which is skilled to deliver further growth to the region.
To truly boost social mobility, it’s imperative that we move away from one-week stints making tea at a family friend’s office under the guise of ‘work experience’. We need to equip young people with real, transferable skills through a range of activities and experiences that prepare them for the modern workplace, including mentoring, insight days, hackathons and panel discussions.
But the public sector can’t do this alone. For initiatives like the MBacc to truly deliver, private sector businesses also need to understand ‘what’s in it for them’. Employer engagement with young people is not simply a CSR exercise, and something that’s ‘nice to do:’ it is a strategic business imperative. Time and time again, we’ve seen how impactful high-quality careers programmes can be, not just for students, but for the businesses involved.
Employees who take part in mentoring or skills-building sessions often develop their own confidence, communication skills, and leadership abilities. They gain fresh perspectives, helping them to better understand the next generation of workers and consumers. And at a time when workforce engagement and wellbeing are increasingly on the agenda, there’s a clear case for integrating outreach into a company’s talent strategy.
The success of the MBacc will depend on effective collaboration between business, government and education, with the new Social Value Model from Government playing a key role in aligning private sector ambitions with national and regional government priorities.
The opportunity is here, and Greater Manchester’s ambition is abundantly clear, but for the MBacc to avoid becoming another dangling carrot, the public and private sectors need to stake their claim before it’s too late.
This article first appeared in the Northern Agenda on 08.04.2025.