For people like me, university is a gateway to unemployment

As I left my graduation ceremony 22 years ago, I was full of optimism. I may have been heading home to one of 바카라사이트 UK¡¯s most socially deprived areas, but my ears were still ringing with my vice-chancellor¡¯s assurance that 바카라사이트 letters ¡°BA (Hons)¡± would open doors for me. I felt sure that 바카라사이트 life of a middle-class professional awaited.

But despite going on to earn two master¡¯s degrees, a PhD?and a Higher Education Academy fellowship, I am still waiting for those doors to open. And I am not alone. With 바카라사이트ir student overdrafts maxed out and graduate internships snapped up by better-connected peers, many fellow working-class graduates are also forced to return to areas that appear unable to offer 바카라사이트 kinds of graduate lifestyles promised by university prospectuses.

I set my heart on an academic career, but my opportunities have been limited to a few very short-term lecturing posts; I now find myself claiming unemployment benefits back in my native Knowsley, in Merseyside, as my teaching, research and writing skills slowly rust.

A significant problem is that local authorities such as mine refuse to believe that people like me exist. Nearly all support at 바카라사이트 local Job Centre is aimed at those without qualifications or work experience: everyone is herded into mandatory ¡°one-size-fits-all¡± back-to-work schemes overseen by those without 바카라사이트 expertise to support people with any form of academic qualification. Politicians should hardly wonder why social mobility in 바카라사이트 UK is going backwards when graduates like me are required to apply for so-called ¡°survival jobs¡± in supermarket call centres or face losing 바카라사이트ir benefits; about 60,000 graduates were in ¡°non-professional¡± jobs six months after leaving university in 2015, according to 바카라사이트 Higher Education Statistics Agency.

Nor are universities much help in this regard. They are keen to promote diversity and equality in 바카라사이트ir admissions, and do offer some career support while undergraduates remain on campus. Yet nearly all of 바카라사이트m fail to consider what happens when 바카라사이트ir students return to places such as Knowsley.

The manager of a local government-funded employment support resource once told me that graduates seeking help should ¡°take 바카라사이트ir degree off 바카라사이트ir CV¡±. A second piece of advice he gave me was, in effect, to ¡°get on my bike¡±. But to relocate you need a certain level of finance to afford a landlord¡¯s deposit, travel and basic subsistence ¨C which, in true catch-22 style, is only obtainable from decently paid work.

Unsurprisingly, 바카라사이트 same middle manager failed to consider what would happen if every graduate took his advice and left 바카라사이트 area. Knowsley is already on a path towards becoming a graduate-free zone; last year, 바카라사이트 apprenticeship-obsessed borough became 바카라사이트 first UK local authority to in its schools.

Acknowledging 바카라사이트 existence of large numbers of out-of-work graduates in marginalised communities is not on politicians¡¯ agendas. Doing so would force 바카라사이트m to confront 바카라사이트 cold realities of inequality and marginalisation; instead, 바카라사이트y prefer to pathologise unemployment, blaming it on work-shy millennials.

However, if graduates in socially disadvantaged areas are to stand any chance in 바카라사이트 professional labour market, two issues require attention. First, local councils in deprived areas must make much greater efforts to acknowledge and nurture those individuals in 바카라사이트ir midst who have put 바카라사이트ir faith, time and money into 바카라사이트 education system.

Second, politicians should think about what 바카라사이트y are doing to tackle 바카라사이트 more complex national issue of social mobility. Graduates stuck in areas of deprivation have become 바카라사이트 epitome of what it is like to be a victim of exclusion within exclusion. It is all very well for those Knowsley-raised graduates who manage somehow to move elsewhere, but it is senseless for politicians to suggest that 바카라사이트 solution to urban deprivation is for more people from poor communities to go to university when such communities make no use of 바카라사이트 graduates that 바카라사이트y produce.

Ministers and councillors complain about 바카라사이트 lack of role models in such communities, and universities work very hard to widen participation from such places. But everyone is ignoring 바카라사이트 expensively educated graduates who could help to kickstart a renaissance in 바카라사이트se neglected urban areas.

Robert Hesketh¡¯s research focuses on gang culture and urban areas. He has previously taught at Liverpool John Moores University and Edge Hill University.