Influenced by Plato's philosopher-kings and the Enlightenment's faith in reason, education has for centuries been regarded as the surest path to individual flourishing and collective progress. But today, the consensus is fracturing. Degree premiums are collapsing, and graduate unemployment is rising. Meanwhile, graduate debt is soaring, in the US surpassing $1.8 trillion. For many courses, the salary bounce is now less than the debt level. Moreover, AI threatens to automate the cognitive skills education is supposed to unlock. Nvidia's Jensen Huang calls for skills-based learning: “if you’re an electrician, a plumber, a carpenter — we’re going to need hundreds of thousands." Moreover, critics argue that in a Wikipedia age with knowledge available instantly to all, it is not the facts that matter, but the judgment and wisdom to choose between them.

Should we conclude that the educated are no longer winning, and that the future will favour the skilled and the self-taught? Should we take seriously Illich's argument that compulsory schooling manufactures conformity? Or should we not reject education itself, but an outdated conception of it that prizes facts over judgment?

Former senior cabinet member and Editor of The Spectator Michael Gove, Oxford economist Daniel Susskind, and Labour life peer Thangam Debbonaire debate the new world of education.