Even as a visa, the degree is becoming less reliable. There is a graduate unemployment crisis in many advanced economies. For example:<\/p>\n
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Statistics Canada data<\/a> shows that job vacancies requiring a bachelor\u2019s degree and under three years of work experience have more than halved since early 2024 (see chart below).\u2028\u2028<\/p>\n In the US, the overall unemployment rate was 4% in Jan-May 2025, but the rate spiked to 6.6% for new college graduates<\/a> aged 20\u201324 with bachelor\u2019s degrees. This marked the highest unemployment level for this group in a decade. \u2028\u2028<\/p>\n PwC data<\/a> shows that the share of recent graduates in graduate-level jobs in the UK in 2025 was lower than at any point since 2014. <\/p>\n Faced with the capacity of AI to erode jobs as well as a fragile global economy, youth need more from higher education than a traditional degree.<\/p>\n This prompts a number of questions. What does it take now for new graduates to differentiate themselves? What does this mean for higher education institutions in terms of what they deliver to students?<\/p>\n In Canada, the supply of graduate-level jobs relative to demand for them has been decreasing rapidly over the past few years. Source: Labour Market Information Council<\/a>Widening ROI between attending one institution versus another<\/p>\n Prof Kapur says that in advanced economies, the value of attending a prestigious institution\/programme is increasing:<\/p>\n \u201cThe competition for graduate jobs is not just all because of AI filling out forms or AI taking away jobs. It\u2019s also because of the stalling of our economy and causing a relative surplus of graduates. So, the simple promise of a good job if you get a university degree, has now become conditional on which university you went to, which course you took.\u201d<\/p>\n In other words, the proportion of university graduates is expanding but the proportion of graduates with a prestigious degree is not expanding in tandem. This increases the marketplace premium of elite university degrees.<\/p>\n The growing need for a \u201cdegree plus\u201d<\/p>\n Of course, most students would love to enrol in a prestigious university, but there are only so many seats available in such institutions. Without that advantage, how can these students gain a competitive edge when they graduate and look for a job?<\/p>\n Many are applying for programmes that include work placements, often known as \u201cwork integrated learning\u201d (WIL), a broad category that includes co-op placements and internships (see here<\/a> for the differences between different forms of WIL).<\/p>\n Demand is soaring for WIL. Almost half of 42,000 prospective international students (47%) responding to a global 2025 Keystone Education Group survey said that the availability of internships is the most attractive feature an institution can offer. This priority was second only to \u201caffordable fees\u201d\u2019(60%) and significantly ahead of other major considerations such as accommodation and even employability, as shown in the chart below.<\/p>\n \u201cAffordable fees\u201d and \u201cinternships\u201d far outpaced other attraction factors for international prospects surveyed for Keystone Education Group\u2019s State of Student Recruitment Report (2025). Source: Keystone Education Group<\/a>Work placements provide an edge<\/p>\n Recent research shows that completing a WIL programme can help graduates to earn significantly more money than graduates who do not participate in a work placement.<\/p>\n For example, Toronto-based consultancy Regionomics<\/a> analysed a large database of university and college graduates in 2023 to determine whether those who participated in a co-op programme earned higher salaries than others three years after graduating from a higher education institution. The research found that:<\/p>\n \u201cThose who did not participate in the co-op programs were more likely to have earned less than C$50,000 than those who participated in the co-op programs while they were students. The former co-op students were more likely to have earned over C$50,000 than their non-co-op peers. The differences in salary persisted even three years after graduation.\u201d<\/p>\n Similarly, a 2023 study by CEWIL Canada, a company that facilitates WIL opportunities, found that 91% of students found jobs related to their studies after participating in a WIL programme<\/a>, a significantly higher percentage than the 71% of students who did not.\u00a0<\/p>\n Other research findings highlight similar trends. For example:<\/p>\n In a 2022 National Association of Colleges and Employers<\/a> (NACE) survey, employers said that \u201chaving an internship with our organisation\u201d or \u201chaving an internship within our industry\u201d were the most influential factors in helping them choose between two job candidates.\u2028\u2028<\/p>\n LinkedIn data published in 2024 found that students who complete an internship are roughly 25% more likely than other students<\/a> to be hired for a full-time position within six months of graduation.\u2028\u2028<\/p>\n According to a NACE survey<\/a> of 247 US employers, more than 70% of employers planned to maintain or increase hiring of interns in 2025.<\/p>\n Employer intern hiring projections. US employers were much more likely to say they would maintain or increase hiring of interns than to say they would decrease this activity in 2025. Source: NACE\u2019s 2025 Internship and Co-op Report<\/a>A compelling differentiator for universities and colleges<\/p>\n Universities and colleges that deliver a range of strong WIL opportunities have an increasingly important offer to students, and most of those institutions are fully aware of this and promoting themselves accordingly.<\/p>\n Other ways of adding values to degrees include:<\/p>\n Including more practical components in traditionally theory-based programmes;<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/africa\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/passport1.jpg\"\/)
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