Dr Pike said that it was entirely acceptable for such incentives to be offered, because the RSC already rewarded success with prizes which go to academic research staff as well as to industry.

The call for £500 rewards was made by the Council for Industry and Higher Education in a review of the supply of young people pursing careers needing expertise in  STEM.

The review said that the government should consider such cash incentives to remedy shortfalls in undergraduates taking those subjects.

Richard Pike stressed that numbers of students taking chemistry at A Level and at university had actually risen in the past three years, with an 18% leap in numbers entering university chemistry courses in that period.

However, although chemistry graduates have high employment rates across a wide variety of occupations, there remains a shortage of the most highly qualified working in the chemical sciences sector, and companies in the UK are having to recruit from overseas.

The RSC has been running “Chemistry: The Next Generation” a project that aims to raise the aspirations of potential students in schools and colleges who are under-represented in HE to take up courses in chemical sciences.

The regions currently involved in the project are the North West, East Midlands and London. Working in partnership with the Royal Society of Chemistry, a consortium of twelve universities, two pharmaceutical companies and two sector skills councils, the project hosts activities such as summer schools and open days, along with a wide range of other outreach work.

Since the project was launched in 2004, over 10,000 students have been reached at a series of highly successful events held in collaboration with HEIs and industry across the three target regions. Evaluation forms were completed by the majority of young people at these events and the results demonstrated that 70% of young people in attendance were more likely to consider chemistry or chemical sciences as a subject option.

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