With geoscience-related degrees seeing a decline in applicants, George Jameson (Diversity and Inclusion Project Lead) discusses the value of further education in Earth science graduate outcomes.

For some time, we have wondered about how beneficial or useful obtaining a degree in the Earth sciences can be for those graduating in the United Kingdom. This question has become more pressing in recent years. Prospective students want to know how useful a degree is and what potential career paths await them as they enter the workforce should they choose to study it.

It was time that we looked into the evidence in order to try answer this question.

We began our evidence gathering by reaching out and getting in touch with all universities in the UK who award Earth science degrees. We know that this information is collected by universities and had assumed that most would be happy to help us with this project. Unfortunately, this approach was not as fruitful as we had anticipated. Although some were happy to share the information, many were not. In fact, too many for us to be able to draw worthwhile conclusions from.

With the data now available to us, we could finally interrogate it and see what we can learn and share with the community. You can access the full report by clicking the link.  

There were some limitations for us, especially when trying to answer our main question.

• The data does not explicitly indicate that a graduate is in relevant graduate employment as a direct result of their degree. Rather, we have relied on where graduates indicated that their degree was necessary (required or advantageous) in securing their current job.
• Sharing low numbers is not permitted by HESA, meaning that we had to suppress that information so that explains the instances of the * symbol throughout.

In total 5980, graduates submitted their information across the 3-year period. This includes fully and partially completed surveys. Of which, 2415 were female (40%) and 3563 were male (60%).

The report breaks down the results of each academic year into the percentage of graduates in some form of employment following graduation (1,329 students). Of this number, 67% stated that their degree was necessary (either required or advantageous) in securing their job.

The 67% of employed graduates who stated their degree was necessary to obtain their job are broken down further by levels of educational attainment in the tables below. This data suggests that graduates with higher levels of educational attainment are more likely to utilise their qualification to obtain employment, with a higher percentage of postgraduates stating their degree as a necessity for securing their subsequent employment than First Degree or master’s students. In turn, this may suggest postgraduates are more likely to enter subject-specific roles on graduation.

2017/2018 (2,015 graduates)

	In employment	Degree necessary
First Degree	512	63%
Masters	256	70%
Postgraduate	121	80%
Total	889

2018/2019 (1,985 graduates)

	In employment	Degree necessary
First Degree	390	56%
Masters	289	72%
Postgraduate	147	76%
Total	826

2019/2020 (1,979 graduates)

	In employment	Degree necessary
First Degree	381	58%
Masters	348	68%
Postgraduate	143	74%
Total	872

The remainder of the report provides a breakdown of characteristics, subject of study as well as graduate outcomes for each academic year allowing you to gain a more detailed understanding of the Earth science graduate landscape in the UK.

Should you have any questions or suggestions on this topic, please do get in touch with us at diversity@geolsoc.org.uk.

Full report available here: https://www.geolsoc.org.uk/~/media/shared/documents/education%20and%20careers/Careers/Earth%20Science%20Graduate%20Outcomes%20Report.pdf