Welcome to Luminate's monthly summary of the key data and developments in higher education, careers services, graduate recruitment and the labour market
This month on Luminate
- Student and graduates change career plans post-COVID - more than a quarter of respondents who participated in a recent Prospects survey indicated that they have changed their career plans due to the pandemic, with just under two fifths saying that they are uncertain about their future career plans. The expert support that university and college careers services provide will be vital in helping young people who are uncertain about their futures. [Luminate]
- A mixed bag: employer perspectives on graduate skills - we regularly hear that graduate skills at the point of hire are not up to employer standards, but the Institute of Student Employers' (ISE) annual Student Development Survey reveals a more complex situation. Graduate employers are generally positive about students' attitudes and behaviours with the vast majority of ISE employers saying that graduates are both creative and adaptable. [Luminate]
- Predictions for the 2021 graduate labour market - Charlie Ball, head of higher education intelligence for Prospects at Jisc, and Rebecca Fielding, Gradconsult founder and managing director, came together to set out their expectations for the coming year. This webinar, recorded on 21 January, lays out the role that SMEs can play in the economic recovery and explores why non-linear career paths are more important than ever. [Luminate]
Charlie Ball's LMI update
Graduate labour market expert and Prospects' head of higher education intelligence, Charlie Ball, summarises the Institute of Fiscal Studies' (IFS) examination of the careers and time use of mothers and fathers.
The average employment and hours of work of men barely change after they become fathers, while the employment of women falls sharply from above 90% to below 75% after childbirth and, among those who remain in paid work, hours of work fall from around 40 to less than 30. Further, the wages earned per hour stagnate for working mothers, while continuing to grow uninterrupted for fathers. Even when women have higher wages than their male partners before childbirth, their employment falls by at least 13% during the first years of parenthood and remains at this lower level for the next decade. Their lower-wage male partners remain in paid work at much higher rates and for longer hours.
Read Charlie's labour market updates, bringing together all the latest reports and research, every week on Luminate.
News in summary
- Funded internships aim to help keep North East graduates in the region - to assist local businesses in boosting their workforce following the coronavirus pandemic, Newcastle College is making nine funded internships available to North Eastern firms operating in the digital technologies and engineering industries. [North East Times Magazine]
- Unblocking the placements logjam through e-placements in healthcare - the availability of in-person placements fell rapidly in 2020, a trend we are likely to see continue through 2021. With this reality increasing anxiety among many students in higher education, it is important that rapid solutions are found. Gilly Salmon says that digital placements can be an adequate substitute if designed well [Wonkhe]
- UK 'heading towards digital skills shortage disaster' - Dr Neil Bentley-Gockmann, chief executive of WorldSkills UK, suggests that one of the main reasons for the growing digital skills shortage is a lack of understanding and guidance about potential career paths - a problem that employers can help address by going into schools and informing students about the opportunities available to them. [BBC]
Research from the Luminate library
How FE and HE providers view employability differently - This HECSU-funded report explores the differences in how both staff and students from FE and HE view employability. Although there were differences in the way that further and higher education providers define employability, there were also many similarities in how it is conceived and presented. Using both qualitative and quantitative data, the report argues that bridging the gap that exists between the way that employability-related research, careers materials and tools are divided between HE and FE would benefit both practitioners and students.
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