What Do Graduates Do

The annual review of graduate destinations for the UK, 'What Do Graduates Do?' is now out. The publication has moved from the not-for-profit careers information organisation, Graduate Prospects, to their parent charity, the Higher Education Careers Services Unit, but is still produced with AGCAS and has only changed a little otherwise.

The BBC picked up on the received-opinion-busting fact that Media Studies graduates are amongst the most employable right off the bat (Challenge stereotypes! ), whilst the Guardian went for a more in-depth analysis leading on reduced unemployment rates for graduates ( Unemployment down 0.5%).

In the publication, there's cause for optimism and for concern. The IT recession, had already started abating by the start of this year and prospects for beleagured computing graduates now look rosier. But physics looks to be in a very worrying state. The University of Buckingham's work was flagged earlier in the week, and the figures for first destinations of 2004 physicists do give some alarm. Physics graduates have a relatively high unemployment rate, and those that do go straight into work don't do physics. Fortunately, there are still a good quarter going on to postgraduate study, and 4.1% are going on to study for PGCEs, so it looks like we're not completely out of physics teachers yet.

Find What Do Graduates Do 2006 here