Graduate Outcomes: latest sector level data

A Graduate Outcomes sector-level dashboard is now available, providing analysis at both institution and subject-level. The dashboard contains data for the League Table-eligible cohorts (UK-domiciled, full-time, first degree) from the 2017/18 and 2018/19 academic years and is intended to enable colleagues to contextualise their scores relative to other institutions. The sector level information from this year is therefore particularly important as this is the first year that the Graduate Outcomes results can be compared to previous years in order to understand Reading’s position within the sector.

Employability Data and Systems Manager Louise Thomas-Burt will be running webinars for all staff to demonstrate the dashboard this week and a recording will be available afterwards for those unable to attend.

In July, the Careers team released the University’s updated internal analysis of the Graduate Outcomes data for the 2018/19 graduating cohort compared with the previous year. This data is available to all colleagues and provides academic schools and departments with valuable insights into the employment impact of their degree programmes and related initiatives. Despite the impact of the pandemic, the sector level results for the University of Reading 18/19 cohort are the highest we have seen for the past eight years, with an increase in ranking from the 69th to the 76th percentile. The proportion of Reading graduates reporting destinations of graduate level work and/or study decreased slightly compared to the 2017/18 cohort, but less than the sector average, which likely contributed to the improvement in our ranked position.

PVC Education and Student Experience, Professor Julian Park said: 'Reading graduates have done well in securing employment in both a competitive and difficult labour market. The combined efforts of the Careers and Placements Team and academic colleagues, working together to provide a range of mechanisms to support career learning and employability skills, have no doubt played a part in this success.'

As the Graduate Outcomes survey was designed to replace the Destination of Leavers from Higher Education (DLHE) survey, we currently only have two years’ worth of data available and therefore can only offer comparison against the 2017/18 graduating cohort.  When comparing with the previous year, consideration should be given to the impact of Covid-19 on the 2018/19 data.

This dashboard is only available to colleagues at the University and contains data rounded and suppressed according to HESA’s methodology.

Please note: This dashboard is our interpretation of the data using the old DLHE methodology. HESA have a slight different way of modelling the data and those interested can find out more from HESA’s Open Data release.

Watch our short video for more information on Graduate Outcomes.

For further information please contact Louise Thomas-Burt, Employability Data and Systems Manager, and take a look at the Graduate Outcomes Essentials webpages.