When did this trend start? ,Why is the proportion of undergraduates from prestigious universities choosing to pursue further studies so high?

Recently, some universities in Shanghai have successively released their latest employment quality reports, attracting media attention. Some overseas media highlighted the data of "18.07% direct employment" of a key university, saying that "the direct employment rate of graduates is less than 20%, reflecting the high youth unemployment rate in China."

Is this really true? How should we interpret college employment quality reports?

It should be said that it is not unique this year for people in key universities such as 985 and 211 to choose to continue their studies after graduation.

Take some universities in Shanghai as an example. Ten years ago, the proportion of Fudan University undergraduates who chose direct employment was lower than those who continued their studies.

In 2013, the employment rate of Fudan University undergraduates was 96.75%. Among them, the proportion of those who continued their education was 59.27%, which was 25.11% higher than that of direct employment. Since then, the number of people choosing to pursue further studies has increased year by year.

In 2019, before the epidemic, the enrollment rate of Fudan University undergraduate graduates was as high as 70.6%, and the direct employment rate was only 19.5%, which is not much different from this year.

This situation also happened at Shanghai Jiao Tong University. In 2019, the school's undergraduate enrollment rate was 75.04%, and the direct employment rate was 23.23%, which is also not much different from 2023.

What’s curious is, where did this trend of continuing to study without getting a job after graduating from a bachelor’s degree come from? The answer may be Tsinghua University or Peking University.

In 2014, Tsinghua University’s undergraduate enrollment rate was as high as 81.6%, and only 16.3% of undergraduates chose to work directly.

In 2014, less than 2 out of every 10 undergraduate graduates from Peking University chose to find a job.

Currently, among the 985 universities in Shanghai, only East China Normal University has a direct employment rate equal to the enrollment rate. As a normal university, in 2023, the direct employment rate of undergraduates at East China Normal University will be 45.03%, while the enrollment rate will be 51.27%.

Therefore, the high proportion of undergraduate graduates from a few prestigious universities pursuing further studies is a trend and phenomenon that has occurred in the past decade. It is not affected by the epidemic, and it has little to do with the economic environment.

In recent years, the destinations of graduates from prestigious schools have not remained unchanged, mainly reflected in:

First, studying at home for graduate school has become a more popular choice than studying abroad.

Before the epidemic, the popularity of studying abroad was increasing year by year. Taking Fudan University as an example, before 2018, the proportion of those who went abroad for further study was once more than 30%, reaching a peak of 34.23%, which was 2 percentage points higher than those studying domestically.

But in 2023, only 17.5% of graduates will choose to study abroad, while the proportion of domestic graduate students will rise to 53.10%.

This phenomenon also occurs in other key universities in Shanghai.

Jiaotong University, Tongji University, East China Normal University and other universities have seen a decrease in the proportion of students studying abroad after the epidemic.

Second, the unemployment rate of graduates has increased.

Affected by the epidemic, it is indeed more difficult for college students to find jobs after graduation than before.

For example, in 2023, the unemployment rate for undergraduates at Fudan University was 11.3%, while in the nearly ten years before the epidemic, the unemployment rate was as high as 5%.

However, judging from the data, it is not this year that has the highest unemployment rate. The unemployment rates of Fudan and Tongji in 2022 are higher than this year, and the unemployment rates of Jiaotong University and East China University of Science and Technology will reach their peak in recent years in 2020.

Judging from the published data, the employment situation of some key universities this year has improved compared with the most difficult period.

Why do students from key universities love to continue their studies?

First, from an objective background, key universities have more opportunities for further study.

Compared with ordinary universities, key universities have more degree-granting points and richer educational resources.

For example, in Shanghai, the total number of postgraduate degree-granting points in 985/211 universities generally remains at around 100, which is almost five times that of ordinary universities.

And because the teaching staff is more abundant, the number of students enrolled in a single degree-granting point is often larger than that of ordinary colleges and universities.

For example, Fudan University’s enrollment in Journalism and Communication in 2022 will be 50, which is 3.13 times that of Shanghai Normal University and 2.78 times that of East China University of Political Science and Law in the same period.

Moreover, key universities often prefer students from their own schools and have more places for postgraduate study.

According to incomplete statistics, the postgraduate retention rates of Tsinghua University, Peking University, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, and University of Science and Technology of China all exceed 60%, which means that at least 60 out of 100 students can continue their studies.

Second, subjectively, students from key universities are more willing to continue studying.

There are many reasons for going to graduate school, such as to train your abilities, enter an ideal university, change majors, or to delay work, etc. It may also be because everyone around you is taking the postgraduate entrance exams, and you are following the crowd.

According to the "2023 National Graduate Student Enrollment Survey Report" released by China Education Online, employment and hobbies are the two major motivations for college students to choose to continue their studies.

Compared with ordinary universities, the "double first-class" key universities will have a stronger atmosphere and stronger willingness to study for graduate school.

According to data from the "China Undergraduate Employment Report", among the 2021 graduates, the proportion of "double first-class" colleges and universities studying for postgraduate studies is 35.4%, which is much higher than the 17.2% of ordinary undergraduate colleges and 13.6% of local undergraduate colleges.