High Level Summary of Statistics Trend Last update: Monday, October 27, 2008
Higher Education Graduates from HEIs and FECs
The number of higher education qualifiers from Scottish institutions has continued to rise, in the most recent year by 4% (2,865 qualifiers), to the record high of 77,380 in 2006-07. Almost half of this increase was due to a rise of 2,120 in the number of masters qualifications obtained. Scottish colleges saw a decrease in qualifiers of 1%, down to 22,030, mostly due to a decrease in the number of HNCs awarded (down by 1,135, 11%).
In terms of broad subject groups, the number of qualifiers from science and engineering has increased by 5%, as have those from education and the arts. Those from business and social studies have increased by 3% and those from medical studies have increased by 2%.
The number of male and female qualifiers have both gone up and since last year the gender gap has closed slightly overall, with 43% male (33,165) and 57% female (44,220) qualifiers in 2006-07. Since 2005-06 there has been an increase of 1 percentage point in the proportion of first degree qualifiers who obtained first class honours (for both males and females).
Scots domiciles account for nearly three quarters of qualifiers from Scottish institutions, 73%. The number of qualifications obtained by international students increased by 17% from 12,725 in 2005-06 to 14,895 in 2006-07. Of qualifiers from outside the EU 62% qualified at postgraduate level (6,555) - accounting for 34% of all postgraduate qualifiers from Scottish institutions. The rise in qualifiers from outside the UK of 7,515, since 1999-00, accounts for 84% of the 8,995 overall increase in qualifiers at Scottish institutions over the same period.
58% of qualifiers from full-time higher education courses at Scottish institutions were in permanent or temporary UK employment 6 months after completing their course, a further 31% were engaged in further study or training. 74% of those in permanent UK employment were employed in graduate level occupations. Over half of qualifiers in permanent UK employment at the time of the survey were employed in either health, social and community work (31%) or finance and business services (24%).
Of qualifiers in permanent employment (in the UK or overseas) the proportion employed in Scotland has increased by 2 percentage points since 2005-06 to 81%. 92% of Scots qualifiers in permanent employment were employed within Scotland, an increase of 2 percentage points since last year.
70% of Scots postgraduate and first degree qualifiers from Scottish Higher Education institutions were employed in graduate level occupations within Scotland or engaged in further study or training 6 months after completing their higher education course. The Scottish Government has set a National Indicator to Increase the percentage of Scottish domiciled graduates from Scottish Higher Education Institutions in positive destinations. This figure is used as a proxy for the Indicator.
The 20% most deprived areas of Scotland contain about 20% of the Scottish population; 10% of Scots qualifiers from Scottish higher education institutions and 20% from Scottish colleges are from deprived areas within Scotland. 38% of those from the most deprived areas of Scotland were in further study or training 6 months after qualifying, compared to 30% of those from other areas. 55% of those from deprived areas were in either permanent or temporary UK employment compared to 60% for those from other areas.
Source: Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA) and Scottish Funding Council (SFC)
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