Job prospects bright for construction graduates

Graduates in building, architecture and civil engineering are more likely to find employment after finishing university than those successful in IT and business related disciplines.

The conclusion follows research, which involved listing by subject the percentage of graduates entering graduate employment and those embarking on further study, carried out by the Higher Education Funding Council for England.

Only the sector which incorporates medicine, nursing and dentistry provides better employment prospects than construction.

Building comes top of the construction class, with 82% of graduates finding employment and 6% going into further education.

A slightly lower 79% of civil engineering graduates enter graduate employment with 10% pursuing further studies, while the totals for architecture shape up at 65% and 26% respectively.

This, however, is no surprise as it is common knowledge that there are plenty of jobs in construction and not nearly enough graduates being generated to fill them. 

Some courses are still struggling to recruit sufficient students in order to operate, as revealed in a study commissioned by the Chartered Institute Of Building (CIOB) last year, which found that viability of courses was the biggest threat to construction programmes.

Alan Crane, chairman of CIOB's presidential commission on construction education, said: "At long last we have evidence to demonstrate to young people that there are excellent job prospects for them in the construction industry.

"The research indicates that the links between education providers and employers are improving. This is crucial for the future of the industry, in order that employers get a workforce with the skills and experience that they require."