UEA welcomes focus on graduate outcomes as Government announces 'crackdown on rip off degrees'
By: Communications
The government has announced today a plan to limit student numbers on courses that fail to deliver good outcomes.
Success for all students is at the heart of UEA’s mission. The quality of courses and teaching delivers relevant skills and experiences that prepare students for the first steps beyond university and the adaptability and resilience to meet their long-term career ambitions.
UEA defines graduate success by taking a student-centred approach, supporting all students to have the confidence, skills, and knowledge to succeed in their desired career path.
Ensuring that courses deliver good outcomes is monitored and regulated by the Office for Students against minimum thresholds of performance. UEA performs above the minimum threshold for all areas of fulltime undergraduate taught provision for progression to professional work and further study.
UEA has just achieved its best ever performance in the Graduate Outcomes metric, with 84% of its graduates in professional work or further study, 15 months after graduation1. 85% of our graduates agree that their current activity is meaningful, and nearly 8 in 10 believe that their activity is on track to meet their career ambitions, both in line with the sector average.
UEA’s success is built on an inclusive approach to support all of our students, and significantly outperforms the sector in a number of subject areas (Business and management; Computing; Mathematical sciences; Chemistry; Pharmacology, toxicology and pharmacy; Allied health; Nursing; Psychology) and for students who are disadvantaged or underrepresented in higher education (mature students, those of Black or Mixed ethnicity; ABCS Q1; IMD Q1 or Q2; and those registered for Free School Meals).
UEA performs well on measures of social mobility, too. The Sutton Trust looks at the percentage of students who were on free school meals but are successful enough to be in the top quintile for earnings at the age of 30, a good measure of economic mobility. UEA outperforms all local competitors for this measure and many Russell Group institutions. Students from disadvantaged backgrounds do very well at UEA on these outcomes-based measures.
The benefits of a university degree are clear: most recent data from the ONS shows that 66.3% of working-age graduates are in professional work, compared to only 23.6% of non-graduates. The average salary of working-age graduates is £38,500, compared to £27,000 for working age non-graduates.
Foundation years have also been targeted by the policy due to poorer student outcomes. However, UEA students who took a foundation year outperform the sector on continuation rates to a degree course, and leads to successful outcomes in terms or professional work or further study.
University ‘drop out’ has also been cited as an area where performance is poor. UEA performs significantly above the minimum threshold in every area, and outperforms the sector for a number of subjects (Business and management; English studies; History and archaeology; Law; Sociology, social policy and anthropology; Geography, earth and environmental sciences; Mathematical sciences; Physics and astronomy; Allied health; Psychology) and for disadvantaged students or those underrepresented in higher education (Mixed ethnicity; Males; IMD Q1 or Q2, those registered for Free School Meals) as well as Foundation year students and International students, demonstrating our high quality transition support and campus experience.
1 Measure based on Times University league table
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