UOPD UWI Graduate Trace Study reveals Bad choices, Entrepreneurship and brain-drain in 2016

Getting employed after graduating from the UWI (University of the West Indies) is looking really bad.

In November 2015, the UOPD (University Office of Planning and Development) released a Graduate Tracer Study of to student employment rates as reported in the article “Graduate Tracer Study Reveals Employment Prospects After UWI Dim”, published Monday November 23, 2015 by Andre Poyse, The Jamaica Gleaner.

There has been decline in employment prospects in most of CARICOM countries that has student attending the UWI, particularly Barbados and Jamaica, even as enrollment levels continue to increase.

It's so bad that some graduates have resorted to begging, prompting South West St Catherine Member of Parliament (MP) Everald Warmington to recommend that they need assistance in getting jobs as reported in the article “Educated Beggars - Warmington Says Graduates Turning To Mendicancy Due To Joblessness”, published Wednesday January 13, 2016 by Daraine Luton, The Jamaica Gleaner.

The negative effect of employment are becoming glaringly obvious when the survey figures are compared with those from 2009, the last time the UOPD did a graduate tracer study.

So how are the graduates from the UWI faring in the world of work?

UOPD UWI Graduate Trace Study – Graduate employment by the numbers

The Graduate Tracer Study started back in 2009 by surveying the students one year after they'd graduated. This means that they then went on to graduate in 2010 with the result collected, tabulated and analyzed later.

This is the case with the Graduate Tracer Study done in 2015; students from 2013 cohort were surveyed, they then graduated and then they were asked if they were working in 2014. So these results were tabulated in 2015, a little after they'd been collected, tabulated and analyzed.

So the employment rate in 2015 for the 2013 student cohort that graduated in 2014 is as follows:

1.      73% employment rate for graduates from Mona Campus in Jamaica

2.      91% employment rate for graduates from Mona Campus in Jamaica in 2009

3.      73% employment rate for graduates from Cave Hill Campus in Barbados

4.      79% employment rate for graduates from Cave Hill Campus in Barbados in 2009

5.      80% employment rate for graduates from St Augustine in Trinidad

6.      91% employment rate for graduates from St Augustine in Trinidad in 2009

But it is when the result are broken down by faculty that the reader will finally see why the employment rates is on the decline. This also serves as a guide for which areas are best to do a degree in at the UWI to guarantee getting a job after graduation.

The faculties with above-average employment rates are as follows:

1.      Education

2.      Medicine

3.      Engineering

The faculties with below-average employment rates are as follows:

1.      Agriculture

2.      Science and Technology

3.      Humanities and Social Sciences

The faculties with the lowest possible average employment rates are as follows:

1.      Life and Physical Sciences

2.      History

3.      Literary

4.      Cultural and Communication Studies and Economics

Interestingly too, the areas that earn the most also happen to be those that have higher than average levels of employment:

1.      Education

2.      Medicine

3.      Engineering

This is something I've always known and is true even abroad as noted in my Geezam blog article entitled “Engineering Degrees are among the Top Earning Degrees in the USA for Jamaican College Students”. 

So what's the cause of the high level of unemployment of UWI students? And are there solutions?

UWI student not choosing properly - Entrepreneurship needed as Overseas work brain-drain looms

Clearly, many UWI students are doing the wrong courses. Albeit I have no figures to confirm the actual number of graduates in each faculty, I'm willing to bet that the above average faculties of Education, Medicine and Engineering make up less than 10% of the total graduating class of 2013, with the remaining 90% being in the other faculties as per Zif's Law.

After all, there is an ongoing shortage of Doctors, Nurses and Engineers in Jamaica as noted in my Geezam blog article entitled “Jamaica facing an acute Shortage of Qualified Technicians and Engineers for upcoming Projects”. 

This means that there are too many persons in Jamaica opting to do courses at UWI that have no job prospects after graduating. It also reflects a lack of lack of proper career guidance to inform students of the areas that are employing people in Jamaica's competitive and harsh labour market.

Most likely those persons that South West St Catherine Member of Parliament (MP) Everald Warmington saw begging were those persons with those degrees from those faculties.

Then again, there is also no employment for students graduating from UWI or if they can finds work, they often end up being under-employed i.e. being paid below their degree level, often jobs that would be reserved for someone with a high school Diploma. Jobs such as working in a Call Center, working as a store clerk or as a manufacturing plant employee are examples of under-employment.

Interestingly, even if all UWI students had the ability to do Education, Medicine and Engineering and opted to do so, there might not be enough places within the Jamaica job market to absorb them.

Jamaica is slowly heading towards a brain-drain crisis as many graduates will now seek employment abroad even as the country is short on many of these professions, including teacher, who are also going abroad as noted in my blog article entitled “Why JA$100,000 won't Stop Mathematics and Science Teachers as Braindrain will accelerate”. 

Entrepreneurship, then, it seems, is the only way out for graduates as noted in my blog article entitled “Why 10000 firms registered in 2015 at Companies Office of Jamaica heralds Recession in 2016”, as depending on the Private and Public sector to employ them will not work.