A bimonthly publication of AQU Catalunya

55

July 2011

The main new development in the Fourth labour market outcomes survey of university graduates in Catalonia, which is being carried out this year, is the participation for the first time of the private universities and twenty-two affiliated institutions. As such, the survey is the most extensive to have been carried out so far in the European Union.

The total reference population for the survey is 28,616 students who graduated at the end of the 2006-2007 academic year, with an actual sample of 16,182. This figure represents a response rate of 56.5% and a sample error of 0.5%. There has been a 66% increase in the sample since the first survey was carried out in 2001.

77.8% of the survey population from campus-based universities in Catalonia were graduates from public universities in Catalonia. Of the remainder, 14.2% graduated from private universities and 8% from affiliated institutions. there was a higher proportion of female students (60% females compared to 40% males).

The majority of the respondees either graduated in the Social Sciences (46.2%) or Engineering/Architecture (24.7%). These were followed by the Humanities (11%), the Health Sciences (11%) and the Experimental Sciences (7.1%).

The survey was carried out by telephone between 24 January and 28 March, the average call duration being eleven minutes and eighteen seconds.

More information: Fourth survey of the labour market outcomes of university graduates in Catalonia

¹ The graduate population from the Open University of Catalonia (UOC) is different to the typical campus-based university graduate population: more than 60% had already completed a previous programme on admission and around 90% worked full-time during their studies. The results for the UOC are therefore given in a section on their own. In the second survey, a total of 954 graduates from the UOC participated (47.8% of the UOC's graduate population), with an equal balance of males (49.9%) and females (50.1%). In terms of the distribution of the courses offered at the UOC, 70% of the graduates from the UOC who were interviewed had taken degrees in the Social Sciences (mainly Business Studies, Economics and Business Administration), 20% had taken degrees in either Engineering or Architecture and 9% in the Humanities. In the 2011 survey, the participants were aged between 27 and 68, with an average age of 39, and 70% of the survey population was aged between 31 and 45.