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Comment: Letters and emails: THE BIG ISSUE: TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION: Better salaries will encourage pupils to study the sciences
[March 02, 2014]

Comment: Letters and emails: THE BIG ISSUE: TECHNOLOGY EDUCATION: Better salaries will encourage pupils to study the sciences


(Observer (UK) Via Acquire Media NewsEdge) It's a result of 20 years of decreasing funding. I'm an electronics graduate and in regular contact with a couple of my lecturers 20 years later. They say that lecturing today is more about how much money you can bring in through research funding or attracting overseas students than education.



Every year, they produce 100 EE (electronic engineering) graduates - on average, 70 of these are from Asia and of the remaining 30, around half take jobs in finance or accountancy, which means that only 15 EE graduates take jobs in the UK electronics industry.

The average starting salary as an electronics engineer is pounds 25,000; the average in finance is pounds 40,000. In Germany, you cannot call yourself an engineer unless you have chartered status and a chartered engineer is paid around the same as a doctor.


I got out of engineering within three years of graduating due to the low salaries. It's the best decision I ever made. Until the UK values engineers as much as other countries I don't foresee the situation changing.

Chris Paris Hitchen, Herts (c) 2014 Guardian Newspapers Limited.

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