Graduates from the University of Worcester are being snapped up into the work place with record high employment rates, new figures reveal.
The Higher Education Statistics Agency has released its latest employment performance indicators, which show that 95.8% of Worcester graduates are in work or further study within six months of leaving.
This is a record for the University and means that 19 out of every 20 students are now employed or in further study. Even during the recent recession and long economic stagnation, employment rates at the University never fell below 92% - or 15 out of 16 graduates.
The numbers of first time graduates entering "graduate-level" professions has also risen, to over 70%.
University Vice Chancellor and Chief Executive, Professor David Green, said: "Graduate employment is high on the agenda at the University of Worcester. Our students have the opportunity to engage in a wide variety of initiatives aimed at preparing them for life after university. Employability is built into all courses, with students under taking work placements, workshops or specific modules and the University also runs an extensive Earn as You Learn programme, and actively seeks to prepare graduates on all of its courses for the workplace."
Professor Green said that the University's outstanding results would be even better if the Office for National Statistics (ONS), which categorises "graduate-level" jobs, stopped their discriminatory categorisation of Graduate Early Years educators as people who are in a "non-graduate" job. Early Years degree courses at Worcester are widely considered amongst the very best in Britain. As Professor Green said: "We have excellent employment rates for our Early Years graduates, who go on to make a huge difference to the lives of young children and their families. Yet this vital profession, led by women, still fails to be recognised as a graduate-level profession by the ONS. This is simply astounding in the 21st Century and something that must be reviewed immediately and then changed."
The record employment rates at Worcester follow the University's most successful year in the National Student Survey (NSS), which revealed that more than 87% of students were satisfied with their experience, above the national average.
"We are delighted that our students are making so much of their opportunities at Worcester and are using this as a springboard to successful careers and purposeful, happy lives when they leave," Professor Green added.