August is always a significant month in education. Across Wales, thousands of young people have received their A level and GCSE results, marking an important milestone and opening up the next stage of their lives.

I want to congratulate them on their achievements. Results day represents a huge amount of work and perseverance, not only from our young people, but from the teachers, lecturers, families and others who have supported them. Whatever the individual results, reaching this point is worth recognising.

But as we celebrate, results season should also prompt a bigger question: why do we still think about education as something concentrated so heavily at the beginning of our lives?

I was struck by two stories I read this week. The Guardian reported that UK job vacancies have fallen to their lowest level in five years, while Nation.Cymru reported calls from the CBI for AI adoption to become a national economic priority, including investment in AI skills at all levels.

Different stories, perhaps, but they point towards the same challenge.

The idea of a job for life has largely disappeared. People increasingly move between employers, occupations and sectors. Transferable skills matter, as does the ability to develop new skills and retrain. That applies to emerging industries, but equally to our foundation economy and the jobs and services our communities depend upon.

And then there is AI.

AI is here. It is powerful and useful, and will undoubtedly change how many of us work. I am enthusiastic about its potential, but we need to learn how to use it well.

That means AI literacy, understanding what AI is and what it can do, knowing when to use it, developing effective prompting techniques, and knowing how to question, challenge and improve an AI-generated response. Most importantly, people need to confidently bring their own knowledge, opinions, creativity and judgement to the process.

AI should assist and enhance human capability and efficiency, not replace it. If we rely on technology to think, write, create and make decisions for us, we risk weakening our capacity for independent thought.

Yet there remains a fundamental imbalance in our approach to education. Compulsory education is rightly a statutory requirement. In adulthood, continuing to learn and develop new skills can look more like a luxury, dependent upon funding, employer support, finances, time and circumstances.

That no longer makes sense.

A genuinely lifelong approach in Wales requires sustainable investment in adult learning, flexible opportunities, greater employer investment, recognition of existing skills and learning designed around people’s lives.

Responsibility must be shared. Government must create the conditions. Employers need to invest in their people. Providers must be responsive and flexible. Individuals also have a responsibility to recognise that the skills we have today may not be the skills we need tomorrow.

We cannot demand greater productivity, embrace AI, expect people to change careers and respond to skills shortages while treating continued learning as discretionary.

Those ambitions simply do not add up.

“What are you going to do next?” should not just be a results day question. It is one we should continue asking throughout our lives.

Kathryn Robson, Chief Executive