On Thursday, July 21st the Agency for Quality Assurance in the Galician University System (ACSUG in Spanish) released its publication: “Labor Market Insertion Study for Master's Degree Graduates in the Galician University System, 2010-2011”. Participants in this event included the General Secretary of Universities and the president and director of the ACSUG.
Since 2001, the Agency for Quality Assurance in the Galician University System (ACSUG) has provided information on the integration of graduates from the Galician University System into the employment market, for 1st and 2nd cycle degrees (diplomas, bachelor’s, and engineering) and undergraduate degrees (grados). With the new structure for university studies now in effect (undergraduate, master’s, and doctorate), it has become essential to have information about the entry of master’s degree graduates into the workplace. For this reason, in 2013 the Agency began a new project by expanding the scope of its studies to include master’s degree graduates from the SUG, becoming the first agency in Spain to carry out an analysis of this type. As a continuation of this initiative, the ACSUG is publishing its second report focused on this theme: "Labor Market Insertion Study for Master’s Degree Graduates in the Galician University System, 2010-2011"(EILMásteres1011).
This publication analyses the results obtained from the second survey of SUG graduates with official master’s degrees, which was given in June and July of 2014, approximately three years after they had completed their degrees. The primary objective of this report is to provide information on university graduates earning their master’s degrees in the Galician University System, in a manner that will allow the results obtained to contribute to improving the quality of the university education offered to future students. The information compiled addresses the following subjects: evaluation by the master’s degree graduates regarding organizational aspects of the master’s degree program and its presentation; their main motivations for pursuing master’s degree studies; and their assessments of their professional experiences during the last few years, both before and after earning their master’s degree. The report also concludes by comparing the results obtained from the two studies performed for master’s degree graduates, those from the 2010-2011 and 2009-2010 academic years.
The study found that the primary motivation for enrolling in master’s degree studies was to complement existing academic training in order to obtain better specialization in the job market, with a percentage of 57.6%, followed by complementing previous academic training in order to pursue a doctorate and work in research, with a percentage of 30.1% for the SUG as a whole. In relation to the distribution by fields of study, the motivation of complementing academic training in relation to the job market is highest in the fields of Engineering and Architecture (68.0%), Health Sciences (61.4%), and Social and Legal Sciences (56,0%), compared to the fields of Arts and Humanities (53.8%) and Sciences (51.6%), where higher percentages were found for the motivation of complementing education to pursue a research career.
With respect to the employment situation prior to earning the master’s degree, 68.3% of the master’s degree graduates were working before enrolling in their master’s program, 8.5% had looked for work but had not found it, and 23.2% had not been looking for employment. Furthermore, at the time of beginning the master’s degree program 61.6% were working at the same time as studying for their degree, while only 4.7% left their job to pursue the master’s degree.
As a new aspect included in this study, the employment trajectory of the SUG master’s degree graduates was also analyzed, from the time at which they completed their master’s degree until the time at which the survey was given. It was found that 91.9% of the master’s degree graduates had worked at some time since completing their master’s degree, with this percentage being broken down into 73.5% currently working and 18.4% who were not currently working but who had done so since completing their degree.
The average amount of time it took for an SUG graduate to find his or her first job after completing the master’s degree is 8.29 months. The graduates who found employment most quickly after completing their master’s degree are those from Engineering and Architecture (6.31 months) and Health Sciences (6.36 months).
At the time the survey was given, 73.5% of the SUG master’s degree graduates were currently working. When the situation is analyzed for graduates who were neither working nor looking for employment, the percentage of graduates performing other studies is notable (4.2%). The majority of those working are doing so in Galicia (88.1%), while only a small percentage are working in a foreign country (1.7%).
There were 44.1% of the SUG master’s degree graduates who said that their work is fairly related or very related to the master’s degree they earned. Additionally, 79.8% of the graduates believe that university education is necessary in order to perform their current job. By branches of knowledge, the highest levels of connection between the job and the master’s degree are found in the branches of Sciences and in Engineering and Architecture, where almost half of the graduates rated this relationship as fairly related or very related.
Overall, the master’s degree graduates from the SUG are satisfied with the university studies they completed, and almost 3/4 of these graduates say that they would enroll in their master’s degree program again.
The sample of students surveyed for this report included 1,526 master’s degree graduates from the 2010-2011 academic year, taken from a population of 2,099, which represents 72.70% of the total population. The overall sampling error obtained was +/-1.23% with a 95% confidence level.
