Research and analysis

Engineering skills: Perkins review

Professor John Perkins' review argues that substantially increasing the number of engineers would help the UK economy.

• From: Department for Business, Innovation & Skills
• Published: 4 November 2013
• Last updated: 15 February 2014 — See all updates

Documents

Professor John Perkins’ review of engineering skills

Ref: BIS/13/1269

PDF, 344 KB, 49 pages

Attitudes to engineering: before and after Tomorrow's Engineers Week 2013

MS Excel Spreadsheet, 66.3 KB

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Details

The review endorses the widely accepted view that substantially increasing the supply of engineers entering the labour market would benefit the UK economy. This would help the economy to be more flexible and resilient, and enable more people to take up new opportunities that technological change presents.

The review includes 22 recommendations for action by government, industry, the engineering profession, and the education sector. We must inspire young people throughout their education. We must also improve the engineering skills supply system to help to develop the types of engineer which current and future industries need.

Professor Perkins is the Chief Scientific Adviser to the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills (BIS).

Attitudes to engineering survey

To coincide with the publication of the review, government, industry and educators launched Tomorrow’s Engineers Week between 4 and 8 November 2013. The week aimed to inspire young people to consider a career in engineering. The data tables show the results of a survey of young people and their parents before and after the week, asking them about their attitudes to engineering careers.

Published 4 November 2013
Last updated 15 February 2014 + show all updates

1. 15 February 2014

   Added research on young people's attitudes to engineering.

2. 4 November 2013

   First published.