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Essentially a structured course with a rising price tag of £9,250 per year. That’s £27,750 if you complete an undergraduate plus another £10,000 or so once you accumulate all that interest, and even more if you’re living out and/or have taken out a maintenance loan.

Advantages

• UK degrees are recognised worldwide
• A degree is supposed to increase your average salary once you graduate
• It’s the only way to enter certain industries (teaching, nursing, law, psychology, medicine, etc.)
• Get a taste of the ‘student life’ (being broke & staying up late)
• Ability to explore communities through various societies
• You may meet some very talented/fortunate people – amazing for your network
• Structured course
• Depending on your university, you may receive a world-class education
• At least the debt wipes out after 30 years and is a progressive tax – this is only great if you plan on not working or are happy accepting the additional tax (see here for more)

Disadvantages

• Not guaranteed a job at the end – can be difficult depending on the job market, even once you land one, the pay may not be great
• Lots of debt which is paid as an additional tax – as if the UK’s tax wasn’t bad enough
• Requires additional courses depending on your career choice, e.g. accounting qualifications such as ACCA, ICAEW or CompTia, AWS, Azure certifications in tech
• Very little practical experience in most cases
• Can be demotivating if you lack a vision – there aren’t any immediate incentives
• Surrounded by degeneracy – people who may push you towards time-wasting and harmful activities
• Most universities require you to do a lot of your own research/learning – depending on your course, the content may be freely accessible online or at a much lower cost
• Some universities offer very poor quality education (and you’re still paying the same £9k+ p/a !??)
• Some employers will demand a degree – although most prioritise your experience and results

I asked myself the question, why should I delay my assessment centre by one, two or three years and accumulate all that debt when I can get it done during A-Levels and start getting paid the moment I leave sixth form? Then weighed up all my options and decided to put all my effort into apprenticeships – it sure did pay off.

Advantages

• No £50,000+ debt at the end of three years, instead you are £60-90k+ up after three years, aged 21
• Ability to work for a top employer at 18 which gives you a head start in your career
• Learn practical skills and apply all the theoretical knowledge
• Build soft skills found in the workplace such as critical thinking, networking, public speaking, etc.
• Be surrounded by serious people who have years-decades of experience
• Take holidays whenever you want – benefit from cheaper holidays at off-peak prices
• Structured course, delivered by an educational provider
• Completely free degree if doing a level 6/7 apprenticeship, in some cases at Russell Group/top universities
• In most cases, you are guaranteed a full-time job at the end, if not then you have a much higher chance at getting another job

Disadvantages

• Tied to a 9-5 contract and following manager’s orders – can always resign but if you’re bad at committing, this isn’t ideal
• Few colleagues around your age – dependent on the company’s apprenticeship investment
• You may not get to experience university life – depending on the program, learning may be remote
• Fewer holidays – you usually can’t just take off six consecutive weeks like you get to have in uni. Welcome to the working life
• The workload may feel overwhelming – yet again, welcome to the work life. But in all fairness, if it is too much, you can always speak to your manager to make changes
• You may get imposter syndrome or feel like you’re adding little value – depending on the role you may experience more of this, but the reality is unless you’re not actively trying to learn, you are definitely adding value to yourself incrementally which will benefit the business sooner than you know

I would highly recommend applying to a big company. This is because you’ll benefit from a higher level of support, higher job security, sense of community and you’ll likely benefit from additional perks such as free private healthcare, gym membership, discounted shares, etc.

I found that because there’s such a huge level of investment towards apprentices (but also interns, gap and placement year students) at IBM – at least in the London office; there are so many young faces, so you don’t always experience that age gap in the office. We get to work from home and because of the nature of my role, I get to travel across the country to other IBM offices, client offices and in some cases (not yet personally), overseas too!

There are also many communities, events, volunteering opportunities during working hours, a dedicated platform for learning and a huge focus on growth & development via a dedicated goal-setting, reflection and feedback platform. This sounds like a sales pitch but in reality, it’s how strongly I feel about working for a company like ours (I am not getting paid to say this).

I’m sold. But what about the grades?

This was a real concern for me. Academically, I am just about average. But what I found is that most corporate employers were asking for BBB. The highest I ever saw was probably AAB or ABB and whatever the equivalent is for a BTEC. In most cases, however, it was BBB, if not slightly lower.

If you’re not academically gifted like me, do not lose all hope. There are level 6 apprenticeships that don’t ask for specific grades. In fact, I received an offer from one and it was an amazing company (FTSE100) in the field I had always wanted. But after deep thought, I rejected it to explore a completely different pathway. With this company, they weren’t worried about your grades at all and were happy to take you on, once you had received an (unconditional) offer.

What if I don’t get any offers?

It is always important to have a backup plan. If you’re anything like me and were completely against the university route, you’d want to know about alternatives and so that’s exactly what I explored.

One thing to note is you may receive reconsiderations. This is likely due to candidates rejecting their offers, so companies will reach out to you, either to offer you the place or agree to a final follow-up interview. I experienced this with a consulting company and a leading Swiss bank – UBS, although by this point I had declined both, since I had two offers.

So this was my Plan B… There’s a lot of hate around taking one but in reality, it’s about what you do with the gap year that can actually put you ahead of everyone else in your age group.