Class of 2015 are most prepared graduates ever
New research has indicated that students graduating this year are more careers focused than previous years, with higher fees being suggested as the reason for this increase.
Many students leaving university this year are the first to have been charged £9000 a year for their tuition after the change was implemented in 2012. Students from the Class of 2015 are now reportedly more careers focused and financially motivated that university leavers of the past.
According to research by independent research organisation, High Fliers Research, students are now more driven than before to find employment after university. It was discovered that 48% of students had begun researching their career before they had finished their first year of university. This was a marked increase from the 30% recorded in 2010.
High Fliers Research also noticed a marked increase in the amount students expected to earn in their first graduate job. The average sum quoted as an expected salary by graduates in 2015 was £23,700, up £700 on the previous year and the biggest increase ever recorded by the research organisation.
Director of High Fliers Research, Martin Birchall, linked these change in attitudes to the increase in fees made three years ago. Birchall said 'Our survey shows that new graduates leaving the UK's top universities this summer - many of whom have been the first to be charged £9,000-a-year tuition fees for their degree courses - are the most careers-orientated, motivated and ambitious of their generation.'
Graduates in 2015 were also exceptional for the amount of groundwork they were putting in. High Fliers recorded that over half of graduates had received formal work experience or an internship. This was also coupled with the amount of casual work, like bar or café work, being at its lowest ever.
Birchall also believes that the preparation put in by the latest graduates was significant to a change in attitudes. He said 'By researching their employment options earlier than ever and completing an average of 6 months' work experience during their studies, they have prepared more thoroughly for the graduate job market than any other cohort in the last twenty years.'
Adding, 'So although the "Class of 2015" face the highest-ever graduation debts, an unprecedented number have already secured a graduate job offer before leaving university and the proportion who are uncertain about their future is at its lowest level for seventeen years.'