Are university degrees still important?

WE’VE all heard Bill Gates’s story. Dropped out of Harvard after 2 years, founded tech giant Microsoft, clinched the title of world’s wealthiest person for decades. He also became poster child for the dropout-to-billionaire trope, paving the way for the likes of Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg, Twitter’s Jack Dorsey, Michael Dell of Dell and the late Steve Jobs of Apple. Their stories showed that there is more than one path to success and inspired many to forge their own.

Textbook knowledge and formal education play a large role in some professional industries such as medicine, engineering or law. But for others, the recent rise in online learning platforms such as Udemy, Coursera and LinkedIn Learning provide an alternative route to learning. Moreover, entrepreneurship in Singapore has also grown rapidly, with the number of startups more than doubling over the last decade to an estimated 55,000, according to the Economic Development Board (EDB). As options for young talent continue to broaden, do university degrees still hold the same relevance and merits?

According to Dr Andrew Kenan Rose, Dean of National University of Singapore (NUS) Business School, degrees are still pertinent to many companies looking to hire new talent.