<#323 Faculty Column>
Graduate Employment Rate
By Kuk Min-ho, Professor, Department of Sociology
Recently the Ministry of Education, Science and Technology announced that 28 universities around the country falsely reported the employment of their graduates. A number of universities have falsified graduate employment data to raise government fund and attract students. Actually, many universities suffer from declining student enrollment and tightened budgets. The ministry funds universities on an annual evaluation basis, and the graduate employment rate is one of the crucial indicators for the evaluation. Nowadays universities do their best to increase the graduate employment rate to receive more funds from the government.
Why is the rate of graduate employment so important to the ministry and universities? It’s because of the slowing down of the economy under neoliberalism and it is taking its heaviest toll on new college graduates. In 2011, among the people in their 20s, almost 40 percent were economically inactive in South Korea. As the employment outlook darkens, the government planned to expand social service jobs. But the quality of the jobs to be created was not good enough. The jobs were mostly temporary jobs suitable for people in their 50s and 60s, and college graduates still have a hard time to get jobs.
There are critics on the government's current method of evaluating universities. The ministry only sees the current graduate employment rate and gives incentives without considering the different circumstances of each university, and also without considering the qualities of the jobs. However, so long as the graduate employment rate is the most important indicator to evaluate universities we have to do our best to increase the employment rate.
The graduate employment rate of the Chonnam National University in 2012 was not so good in comparison with other universities. It was 48.0 percent, 8th among the ten national universities. The employment rate of the Chonnam National University this year has dropped remarkably in the College of Law and the College of Social Science. Now it's time for colleges to make efforts to increase the graduate employment rate.
The problem in our university is that students chose the university and their major not based upon their interests but by the scores of the entrance exam. Thus, they do not show a strong will to design their future career in the early stages of college life and also they do not have a strong self-conviction that they can get a decent job. What is needed first is that students have to have a strong will and cultivate strength, stamina, and real power to get a decent job in the job market. They have to prepare by planning systematically for the future by themselves. Also they have to spend more time to enhance their English proficiency which is a critical point in getting a decent job. Colleges now are concerned more about developing graduate employment programs and requiring professors to spend more time and energy for the students' academic and career counseling.
국민호 사회학과 교수
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