With the rapid expansion of the UK higher education sector over the last decade, the 1990s have witnessed unprecedented upheavals and change within the UK graduate recruitment market.
This has been reflected not only in the huge increase in the numbers of students graduating - student numbers in the UK have actually doubled over the last 10 years - but also in the emergence of an increasingly complex and diverse labour market where graduates are no longer guaranteed the jobs a university degree would once have secured. Despite the vast increase in the number of graduates entering the labour market, however, the value of a university degree appears to have remained constant. While graduates have been moving into broader, and in many cases less prestigious areas of employment than would previously have been considered acceptable, on average they still earn more than the less qualified. starting salaries range from #10,000 to #20,000 a year with a UK average of #15,500.
According to recent research by the Institute of Employment Studies at the University of Sussex, some 300,000 students graduated in 1997 - 226,000 of them with first degrees, 33,000 with sub-degree qualifications such as HNCs or HNDs and nearly 50,000 with postgraduate qualifications.
Of these, more than 150,000 first degree students moved almost immediately into employment, and six months after graduation only 8% remained unemployed.
If surpluses are to be avoided throughout the remainder of the 1990s and beyond the millennium, however, existing research would suggest that due to the changing nature of employment, graduates will be forced increasingly to look to new or non-traditional occupations not previously associated with graduate recruitment.
Over the past few years, vacancies among the major graduate recruiters have remained relatively significant - particularly for entry to professional, scientific, and management training programmes. They will, however, continue to provide only a small minority of jobs for graduates, and last year took fewer than one in eight new graduates entering the UK labour market.
The latest available statistics from the Scottish Office, Education and Industry Department, on graduate destinations and trends in graduate recruitment relate to 1996 and were published in March of this year. The Scottish Office figures depict a broadly similar situation north of the border to the national average, and show that a total of 50,849 students graduated from Scottish higher education institutions in 1996, compared to 23,110 in 1986.
Of these, 26,766 students graduated with first degrees, 16,411 with sub-degree qualifications or diplomas and 7642 with postgraduate qualifications. Almost 84% entered employment directly or went on to further study. The proportion of students from Scottish universities or higher education institutions classified as unemployed eight months after graduating also reflects the UK national average, and in early 1997 stood at more than7%.
In Scotland 18% of graduates entering permanent employment in 1996 went into science and engineering, closely followed by a variety of occupations relating to the social services which accounted for some 17% of all Scottish
graduates.
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