NOTA DE EDITOR. A CONTINUACIÓN SE TRANSCRIBEN LOS ARTÍCULOS TRANSITORIOS DE LOS DECRETOS DE REFORMAS A LA PRESENTE LEY

Although we found many individual reasons behind STEM graduates’ decisions to enter careers unrelated to the field of their STEM degree, the reasoning for the majority was a perception that other work would be more interesting. Related to this, for some, their chosen STEM degree turned out to be less interesting than expected and they actively sought a change. The

decision for most seems therefore to be very much a matter of individual choice – taking

into account lots of different and rather personal as well as employment factors – rather than being fully based on one or two ‘rational’ factors such as earning potential or career prospects, or external factors such as difficulty or inability to obtain STEM employment due to skills/job mismatch, or a lack of jobs in the graduate’s desired location. However, for a minority these more ‘rational’ reasons were the more significant ones.

We observed a considerable number of cases of what might be called ‘career drift’. Whether they end up working in STEM employment or not, many graduates’ paths are affected by a

lack of career decisiveness at graduation and even later. This may be linked with a lack of

knowledge about real STEM jobs and their environment, about the career opportunities that exist for STEM graduates, and also the relationship between a STEM degree course, either in general or as a specific subject, with particular jobs and careers. It seems that the firmer the

career thinking, at any stage, the more likely the STEM student or graduate is to pursue a STEM job and career.

A positive benefit of this position – where most students are not fully decided on their career goal – however, is that they remain potentially “influenceable” at university, and even beyond. As such there are opportunities for employers and other stakeholders to make their case more vigorously, in order to compete with others in the labour market. Although many STEM Specialist employers are relatively small organisations (smaller than the largest graduate

recruiters and with much lower profile), this is not universally the case. Also, it does not appear that only small STEM employers are reporting recruitment difficulties.

The observation that few students are primarily motivated by pay should offer comfort to STEM employers. Indeed, if it is interesting work and job satisfaction that students seek, then opportunities abound within STEM employment fields which promote just those qualities in such a way that graduates are attracted more strongly. This is reinforced by evidence that degree- related work experience encourages more to apply for STEM jobs in the long term; i.e. that ‘real’ knowledge is positive in terms of increasing STEM career attractiveness. If STEM students are exposed to and gain better knowledge of what it is really like to work in STEM employment, this ought to improve the prospect of higher proportions applying for STEM jobs. This appears to be a similar finding to that reported in CRAC’s work with students considering IT careers (2008), where many chose other fields based on the perception that work in IT would be boring. Across the range of STEM employers and jobs, there will be many opportunities to promote the intrinsic interest of working in STEM, and its benefit to society and the environment, as well as its competitive career returns. It seems, on the surface, somewhat counter-intuitive that many students appear to ‘leave’ STEM on grounds of seeking interest at work, yet one of the career destinations many such graduates enter is accountancy / financial services, which does not have a reputation for interest.

Another aspect of this issue of career decisiveness (or rather indecisiveness) is our important finding that relatively few STEM students or graduates chose their degree course with a

specific career direction in mind. This has also been found in other studies (see most

recently the Futuretrack study of 2006 degree entrants, HECSU, 2008a). Also, many of those that did give future careers consideration at that stage realised that a STEM degree could keep open or even advance them in lots of different career directions. This was as apparent for subjects seen as strongly vocational, like Engineering, as those that are less so like Physical Sciences, and was stronger still in Mathematics. This is important for policy implications, as it calls into question, to some extent, the concept of a ‘pipeline’ of STEM-qualified graduates and skills, and the expectation that the ‘default’ direction for STEM graduates will be to adhere to a STEM career pathway. Not doing so is seen as something ‘wrong’ or a ‘loss’ in the pipeline model, but this does not hold true for the graduates. Although our cohort of graduates were mostly strong and many worked for larger employers outside specialist STEM sectors, it was clear that for them at least the ‘default’ direction while at university had been Generalist or non- STEM corporate graduate schemes.

What this perhaps highlights is that there should at least be some limitation on expectations of the proportion of STEM graduates who will emerge from the ‘pipeline’ at the end, i.e. into STEM employment. Many students appear to enter the pipeline without knowingly intending to travel its length – hence the expectation needs to be reduced that they will emerge at the end into STEM occupations. It also is apparent from this study (and others) that there is value in a wider

bring to job functions and workplaces, and this should be more positively recognised and encouraged (though not at the expense of meeting the needs of the specialised STEM sectors).

The potential ‘broadening’ career benefit of studying STEM qualifications needs more

recognition within the higher education community. It has become recognised within 14-19 education policy and in recent initiatives to encourage more young people to study STEM subjects post-16. Our research has shown that a wide range of jobs are open to STEM graduates, and that they can be highly sought by employers, in both STEM and non-STEM sectors. This should be an underpinning element of careers advice given prior to higher education or other post-18 choices.

As the students progress through their degree studies, their career thinking firms up and seems to shift from purely aspirational early on to a combination of aspiration and pragmatism by the time of graduation. However, many do not apply for jobs until after they leave university; this is the case both for those intending to secure career-related employment after university as well as for those on our ‘tracks’ (3) and (4), described earlier. Accordingly, as it is conducted only six months after graduation, the Destinations of Leavers from Higher Education (DLHE) survey

is unlikely to give a good indication of the career-related employment of graduates, and

more attention needs to be given to measuring employment outcomes at least a year, and ideally several years, after graduation.

During their period of degree study, students become more aware of certain issues in the labour market, and some develop rather negative perceptions of STEM employment while many respond positively to the high profile and substantial public relations efforts of the major corporate recruiting employers on campus (mostly non-STEM and STEM Generalist employers). We observed many cases of such job applications in parallel with those to STEM Specialist employers, which reinforces the impression of a lack of decisiveness or indicates that they were consciously keeping options open. Accordingly, issues like employer reputation, opportunities for professional training and even how corporate cultures might conflict with their personal beliefs, enter their thinking, as well as practical issues such as the ease of getting a job or its potential location. The net effect of all these influences seemed to be to

encourage a higher proportion of them to make job applications and enter jobs unrelated to their degree than we might have expected from the headline results on students’ career intentions, where the vast majority said that they were likely to stay in STEM fields.

Their subsequent career decisions seem to have been even more individually orientated than underlying subject, HE institution type, gender or other external factors would suggest.

For STEM students, there is clearly a wide range of job opportunities open if they develop the appropriate academic and personal skills and knowledge sought by employers. However, more

opportunities are needed to develop work experience and genuine knowledge about work and careers in STEM, in order that more students can make more informed career decisions. For employers, especially those in STEM Specialist sectors, there is the potential to

help students shape and firm up career ideas while at university and beyond. They need to make their case more visibly and strongly, for the attractive features of STEM jobs and careers, especially where there is interesting work. In that way they might influence more students, especially the less decided and the ‘career drifters’, of whom there are many. Additional provision of information of this contextual nature, before students choose their degree courses, would also be welcomed by them.