Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services (AGCAS) Disabilities Task Group (2013). What happens next? A report on the first destinations of disabled graduates. Available
Association of Graduate Recruiters (AGR) Graduate Recruitment Survey, Winter Review 2013 (January 2013). Available
Elias, P. & Purcell, K. (2004). SOC(HE): A classification of occupations for studying the graduate labour market, Research Paper No. 6. Available
Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) , Destinations of leavers from higher education institutions 2012/2013. Available
Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) (2013) Destinations of leavers from higher education institutions: Longitudinal survey of the 2008/2009 cohort. Available
High Fliers, Graduate Market in 2014 (January 2015). Available
University of Sussex, Careers and Employability Centre, annual data for previous years' Destinations information is available at What Our Graduates Do
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Professional /Managerial |
Managers, directors and senior officials (1xxxx) |
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Professional Occupations (2xxxx) |
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Associate Professional and Technical Occupations (3xxxx) |
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Non-Professional/ Managerial |
Administrative and Secretarial Occupations (4xxxx) |
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Skilled Trades Occupations (5xxxx) |
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Caring, Leisure and Other Service Occupations (6xxxx) |
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Sales and Customer Service Occupations (7xxxx) |
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Process, Plant and Machine Operatives (8xxxx) |
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Elementary Occupations (9xxxx) |
How the Careers & Employability Centre collects the data on student destinations.
The survey is called Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education - DLHE. The information forms part of a cycle of data on students and graduates collected by Sussex University for HESA (Higher Education Statistics Agency).
Students are surveyed six months after they have left the university and asked what they are doing on a particular date. Main destination categories include working, studying, working and studying, and unemployed/looking for work. Additional information is collected about the nature of the work and study, and the reasons for choosing that destination. Students are sent a postal survey, directed to a web page and also followed up by telephone.
All university careers services conduct the same survey and follow the same methodology. This involves using a standard questionnaire and text for covering letters (provided by HESA) and carrying out the research within a defined time frame.
The information students provide is used in a variety of ways, all of which are anonymous and do not identify students in any way. Firstly, the information is used statistically at a national level to compare universities, for example by using an employment performance indicator (www.hesa.ac.uk/pi/home.htm). These statistics are also used to inform prospective students about job prospects when comparing and choosing universities, for example via league tables and at www.unistats.com
Secondly, the information is used to inform current and prospective students more generally about what they can do with their degree. This can be at a national level, (for example through the annual publication “What do graduates do?”) and at a university level (for example, information is available on the Careers & Employability Centre website at Sussex University and is used by careers advisors).
Further explanation of the use of the data is available at the HESA website – www.hesa.ac.uk.
If there are queries about the collection of the first destinations data they can be directed, in the first instance, to David Gillman (d.w.gillman@sussex.ac.uk)in the Careers and Employability Centre, The Library.
