IER News & blogs

Last year, 2023, was The European Year of Skills. Its purpose was to address skills shortages and promote reskilling and upskilling. It is also intended that workers acquire the right skills to access quality jobs. Such aims are laudable and extend the strong and continuous emphasis on the importance of skills by the European Commission. However, policy on management is also needed.

It is almost seven years since the introduction of the apprenticeship reforms in Spring 2017. Since then, apprenticeship provision has changed dramatically for both apprentices and apprentice employers.

The publication of the latest apprenticeship data enables an analysis of a further complete 12 months of the apprenticeship programme, the lasting effects of the 2017 apprenticeship reforms (of which the levy has been the most impactful) as well as the more recent pandemic.

IER’s Dr Sangwoo Lee presented one of his recent research papers at the Centre for Global Higher Education (CGHE) Seminar on 23 January 2024. This paper, co-authored with Prof Francis Green at UCL, examines trends in job quality, the gender job quality disparity and the job quality premium.

On 23rd January 2024 Eamonn Davern made a presentation in IER entitled 'Trends in the development of Public Employment Service Delivery Models'.

IER was formally invited by the International Labour Organisation (ILO) to organise, facilitate and escort a delegation of Careers Centre Managers from Egyptian universities as part of a formal Study Tour in England.