UCAS figures: Upward tick for engineering

Verity O’Keefe, senior employment and skills policy advisor at EEF, the manufacturers’ organisation, says: "The figures show that the number of applicants to study engineering has increased by 7%. This is a much needed upward tick for our sector which continues to cry out for young talent. Manufacturing needs to find almost one million workers by 2020 simply to replace those retiring or leaving industry. If we are to meet this challenge head-on and provide the skilled workers that industry needs the number of UK engineering graduates needs to increase significantly.  

"While these statistics show good progress is being made, applications are just the beginning. We must fix the ‘leaky’ engineering pipeline to ensure that today’s applicants will become tomorrow’s skilled engineers.”