Career Outcomes for Graduate Students: Tracking and Building Pathways

Hong Kong

Increasingly, graduate institutions from around the world are seeking to enhance the professional skills and career outcomes of Master’s and PhD students. Many stakeholders join them in their efforts: national and provincial governments are working to strengthen the link between graduate training and workforce development, and international and local employers are joining national conversations about transferable skills and workforce needs. Most importantly, graduate students in many countries are asking for improved information and support for their career development both inside and outside academe.

These parallel trends have led graduate deans and other senior university leaders to closely follow workforce trends both locally and globally. Many universities have also sought to develop better methods of tracking graduates’ career pathways and to develop programs that prepare students to adapt to new and evolving career demands. The Fifth Annual Strategic Leaders Global Summit on Graduate Education, Career Outcomes for Graduate Students: Tracking and Building Pathways, provided an international forum for exploring these efforts and exchanging best practices.

The 2011 Summit addressed a range of important topics:

• National Contexts for Graduate Career Development
• Local methods of tracking career patterns and outcomes
• Development of program missions in relation to careers
• Integrating workforce demands into degree design and evaluation
• Professional development programs that support career progression
• Creating a productive dialogue between universities, government, and industry about workforce demands and trends
• Approaches to global collaboration in career tracking and professional development for graduate students

At the conclusion of the summit, thirty-five participants from 16 countries agreed to a statement of principles to strengthen and create pathways from graduate schools to careers.

Event Materials:

• Summit Agenda
 (PDF)
• Press Release
• Principles and Practices for Building Pathways from Graduate School to Careers (PDF)
• Global Perspectives on Career Oucomes for Graduate Students: Tracking and Building Pathways

CGS contributions to the 2011 Summit were supported by a generous gift from ProQuest.