£187m upskilling package to get young people into tech

A new skills programme is to equip young people with tech and AI skills, as part of a £187 million package to train up students for tech careers of the future.

Although AI is growing thirty times faster than the rest of the economy, access to skills remains one of the biggest barriers to growth. The AI sector is valued at £72.3 billion and employs over 64,000 people cross more than 3,700 companies. A TechNation report found that one in three UK tech founders say the availability of top talent is their biggest barrier to growth.

The programme, “TechFirst”, follows research from the Department for Science Innovation and Technology (DSIT) that shows that by 2025, around ten million workers will be in roles where AI will be a part of their role or responsibilities in some form, with a further 3.9 million in roles directly in AI. The programme will support over 4,000 graduates, researchers and innovators through its three strands:

The main part of the programme, named “TechYouth”, has been supported by £96 million of government funding, which will give one million students over three days across every secondary school in the UK the chance to learn about technology and gain access to new skills, training, and career opportunities. 1,000 UK students will be supported with undergraduate scholarships in areas like AI, cyber security, and computer science, as well as 100 Research MSc places and 100 elite scholarships.

TechExpert has received £48.4 million in funding and will give up to £10,000 in additional funding to 500 domestic PhD students researching tech with the aim of accelerating innovation and strengthening the UK’s research output, and TechLocal, receiving £18 million, will offer seed funding to help regional innovators and small businesses develop new tech products and adopt AI.

A new online platform will work to inspire and education students about careers in technology, which will build on CyberFirst’s Explorers which already has 100,000 registered students across secondary schools int he UK. This will bring together learning tools and training opportunities in a streamlined accessible space.

Prime minister Keir Starmer said: “We are putting the power of AI into the hands of the next generation—so they can shape the future, not be shaped by it.

“This training programme will unlock opportunity in every classroom—and lays the foundations for a new era of growth.

“Too many children from working families like the one I grew up in are written off. I am determined to end that.

“This programme is the Plan for Change in action—breaking down barriers, driving innovation, and giving every young person the chance of a good, well paid job and a bright future.”