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Higher education

Talk to other parents whose children are preparing for university on our Higher Education forum.

Do students land graduate jobs after their degrees?

67 replies

bevelino · 22/04/2017 22:29

Have your dc's landed graduate jobs after university?

I have 4 dd's who will be in higher education at the same time (triplets), 2 of which want to be teachers and I am confident that if they graduate they will get jobs. The other two have no idea about what they want to do and I would be interested to know whether most students eventually find a job for which a degree is needed.

OP posts:
Stopyourhavering · 29/04/2017 10:00

Dd 1 graduated with 2:1 from uni last year and is just finishing her MSc in TESOL at RG uni , has had 7 interviews and been offered jobs for all of them....she's be going off to teach English in China once her visa comes through....plans to teach for a couple of years and then come back to do a PhD in linguistics
Not bad for a girl with severe dyslexia , dyscalculia and dyspraxia who was told she'd be lucky to get some GCSEs by her first secondary school
Dd2 is in process of securing a year placement year in the city, which will hopefully put her at an advantage when she graduates( she did a BTEC at college before Uni)

buckyou · 29/04/2017 10:04

I did maths and me and everyone I know off my course got grad jobs.

Beebeeeight · 29/04/2017 11:48

Of the graduates I know who are now in their 30s:

3rd 60s uni soc sci - call centre
2:1 60s uni engineering- engineer
All the medical students are now consultants.
Of the 2 law students, one went into academia and is now unemployed
The other did the big city law thing then gave it up after a decade is now studying again
Of the 3 graduates one is a politician one a writer and one a management consultant
The nursing students all became nurses but often had to move away from home to get jobs, the same with teachers

Most people with non vocational undergraduate degrees had to do a vocational masters to get a job

I think this is something kids from non uni backgrounds don't realise.

I was certainly disadvantaged by my parents assuming that degree = great job without further study. It isn't that simple. The undergraduate degree just opens the doors. Without further study it just gets call centre/ admin/ retail type jobs in my experience of arts/ social science subjects at local unis.

I wish I'd known this as a teen.

Beebeeeight · 29/04/2017 11:48

That should be 3 oxbridge!

Headofthehive55 · 29/04/2017 15:31

I think there is a lot of luck involved. It's certainly not a guaranteed route to job success.

DieSchottin93 · 29/04/2017 22:18

I graduated in 2015 and still haven't found a "proper" job. Did a year in retail and am now coming to the end of my language assistant placement. I'd be happy enough with a 9-5 office job but seeing as I've never worked in an office environment that's sort of going against me Sad

Most of the coursemates either did a British Council language assistant programme, did a masters or got a job.

scaryclown · 29/04/2017 22:34

NEVER EVER EVER tell grads to 'start at the bottom' or ' learn how to work'
If you do this you have to earn approval from resentful little fucks who didn't go to uni and want to get back at world by being a cunt to you. ' learning to work' means you have two or more years of' no progression' on your CV. Better to have organised some illegal piss ups and call it events management and lots of' sitting in a room talking about what one could do' that you can describe as 'strategic decision making' (strategic is nothing to do with getting anything done, but it pays more that simply doing f-all) .These are 'graduate level' skills

scaryclown · 29/04/2017 22:37

Oh and I'm not being sarcastic. I was a skills tutor for a major UK uni.

jeanne16 · 30/04/2017 07:40

Scaryclown. I have to say that while I wouldn't use your language, you are quite correct. The whole point of getting a degree is to avoid starting at the bottom. Before embarking on a degree, people should try to have an idea of where it is leading.

Headofthehive55 · 30/04/2017 08:17

But you do need an income. And sometimes those are the only jobs that you can get.

treaclesoda · 30/04/2017 08:35

If my friends and family had waited to secure graduate level employment, most of us would still be unemployed 20 years after graduating.

I know a couple of people who were adamant that they would take nothing less than a graduate level job and they were still unemployed and living at home with their parents (with absolutely no income, since you can't even claim benefits if you are going to turn down work) in their late 20s. And in all honesty, everyone laughed at how up themselves they were. One of them eventually took a job in a petrol station when he was about 32...

LadyTennantofTardis · 30/04/2017 10:22

Official stats on employment rates for different courses can he found on Unistats. My advice to them is to try and get as much advice and practice on interviewing and applications. Also any work experience they can get is great, if they can afford to volunteer that's great. Keep an eye out for graduate schemes with large employers and government. I wish I had taken advantage of these when I was young enough to have the flexibility to travel, they often require working in stints around the country/world.

LadyTennantofTardis · 30/04/2017 10:26

Also if they can afford to give themself time to concentrate on applications after graduation, while working part time, to enable them to do comprehensive job search while doing good quality applications whilst demonstrating work ethic and gaining references.

JanetBrown2015 · 30/04/2017 10:35

Another important issue is not to get your timing wrong and leave it too late. Eg the best law firms recruit at least 2 years in advance so if you wait until just before you graduate you have missed the boat unless you can afford endless gap years. it takes about 5 minutes to check these kinds of deadlines on line and any student can do it easily. Plenty of them will be looking at your A level grades and your first year university exam results as to each module taken so don't mess around in year 1 at university either.

Gannet123 · 30/04/2017 11:28

I think there are a couple of 'transitions' from school to university/job hunting which are crucial to get right and which can often make the difference between success or failure in getting graduate work.
The first is the de-emphasising of marks. At school, the focus is on getting the grades that you need to do what you want to do at university - mostly, if you get those grades, you get your place, so it's all about marks and getting the highest possible mark. The graduate job market is quite different - most graduate jobs require a 2(I) degree or higher, but most graduates get that. I find some students remarkably resistant to the idea that if they are getting solid 2(1) marks, their priority needs to be on extra curriculars to develop skills and experience, rather than pushing up to a first - there are very few circumstances where having a first rather than a 2(1) will make a material difference to your chances of employment. Internships help, but so do other sorts of involvement at university - volunteering, clubs and societies, and generally taking time to be involved and understand about the world you're hoping to be part of. Most universities will have huge amounts of advice and practice available, but making it compulsory just doesn't work - students have to want to make time for it and that's about understanding what is required and that employers want to employ individuals, not degree transcripts.
The other is about having a realistic sense of what you want to do and how to get there. This means moving beyond school level "I want to be an xxx" and understanding what that really means, how many different ways there might be of being an xxx, and what other alternatives to being an xxx might exist that might actually suit better, and planning a route to becoming an xxx which, in many cases, may not be easy. It's about moving beyond thinking of career as something that happens in the future, and realising that university is not the last step of education but the first step of your adult, professional life. Sometimes it's about understanding your first job as your first job, and not the thing you are going to be stuck in for ever - some students seem to get paralysed because they think they have to decide what they are going to have to do for the rest of their lives, when really all they have to do is decide what road they want to go on, and how they are going to support themselves. Very few of us achieve our ambitions at the age of 22, and most of us take lots of twists and turns in life, and sometimes I don't think young people quite see that. The risk is either that they get paralysed into not making applications at all (and if you don't apply, you won't get a job) or they are too selective and want to get to the perfect job straight away, rather than thinking strategically about ways and means.
So in my experience, most students get graduate jobs, but some get them quicker than others and, generally, I can predict who is and isn't going to by seeing how they are approaching their university life.

fussychica · 01/05/2017 13:41

DS did a multiple language degree and got a high 2.1. Went onto Oxford as a post grad and then pgce. Is now a teacher of MFL in a large secondary school which is what he always wanted to do. Whether he moves on to something else after a few years is anyone's guess.
Almost all his friends from uni, both linguists and otherwise, are working in graduate jobs, including at least one abroad. A couple of others are working but still struggling to find something in their chosen field.

I think a number of things come into play here. Degree subject, whether you are prepared to move for a job, personality and luck all play their part. I agree that doing things beyond your degree also helps.

scaryclown · 01/05/2017 14:00

Tbh, i am constantly surprised how many employers are unaware even that they have graduates let alone alone the deeper skills of their teams as they develop.

I don't consider i have ever had a job that a clever person couldn't have developed into with employer support, and I've only used my graduate level skills in one role, really.

I think two things simultaneously..That the employment markets isn't making best use of skills and abilities at all, and that degrees are a horribly exploitative racket with few truths.

I've applied like buggery, achieved huge delivery objectives, yet have never been through an assessment centre, been genuinely tested in role, been appreciated, or an above average salary. In fact over delivering has caused me no end of misery, and I've also been effectively unemployed for 6 years.

I don't think the employment market knows how to find, develop, exploit or even take advantage of, the majority of people with skills in the country.

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