Positive Prospects: Careers for social science graduates and why number and data skills matter

Abstract

This is the second in a series of higher education data releases from the Department for Education's new Longitudinal Education Outcomes dataset. It focuses on the employment and earnings outcomes of those graduating with an undergraduate degree in 2008/09 from an English higher education institution (HEI). It looks at outcomes one, three and five years after graduation. Data are split by subject studied and graduate characteristic (sex, ethnicity, age, home region and prior attainment at A level). Employment outcomes are also provided for each HEI. A further release is scheduled for spring 2017 covering outcomes by each subject for each institution. In order to gain user feedback, this release previews this type of information by looking at employment and earnings outcomes for 2008/09 law graduates. This publication also explores the impact of including self-assessment data for the 2014/15 tax year. Overall employment and further study outcomes 5 years after graduation vary little by subject studied (2008/09 graduates)'Biological sciences' and 'medicine & dentistry' had the highest proportion of graduates in 'further study, sustained employment or both' 1 five years after graduation (83.5 per cent and 83.3 per cent respectively). However, this is only 6.4 percentage points higher than those who studied a 'combined' degree. These figures include self-assessment data.1 Graduates are counted as being in sustained employment if they for work one day in five months out of six between October and March in the relevant tax year (See section 8: methodology for further details).