SINGAPORE – Close to six in 10 graduates from private universities here find full-time jobs within six months of graduation, though their salaries continue to lag behind those of their peers from autonomous universities.
The latest Private Education Institution Graduate Employment Survey, released by SkillsFuture Singapore on April 25, showed that 58.7 per cent of graduates from private institutions in 2023 secured full-time permanent jobs, compared with 60.9 per cent in 2022.
There were also fewer of these graduates in part-time or temporary work (18.9 per cent, down from 20.5 per cent in 2022), but more were doing freelance work (5.7 per cent, up from 5.1 per cent in 2022).
Overall, of the 2,400 economically active graduates – those who are working, or not working but actively looking and available for jobs – surveyed, 83.2 per cent found permanent, freelance or part-time jobs within six months of graduating, a drop from the 86.5 per cent in 2022.
The median gross monthly pay for the 2023 cohort increased from that of 2022, with private university graduates in full-time positions earning $3,400, up from $3,200 in 2022.
Graduates from the Singapore Institute of Management earned the most, with a median gross monthly salary of $3,500, while graduates from Kaplan Higher Education Academy received $3,000.
The median gross monthly salaries of graduates from some institutions, like Parkway College of Nursing and Allied Health and Raffles College of Higher Education, were not revealed because of the small sample size of respondents in full-time permanent employment.
Fresh graduates from autonomous universities, such as Nanyang Technological University and the National University of Singapore, started with a median monthly salary of $4,313, according to the employment survey of the 2023 batch of autonomous university graduates, released on Feb 22.
About 84.1 per cent of graduates from autonomous universities secured full-time permanent roles within six months, with 4 per cent doing part-time or temporary work, and 1.5 per cent working freelance.
Post-national service (post-NS) polytechnic graduates, meanwhile, started with a median monthly salary of $2,963, up from $2,800 in 2022.
Among 2023’s graduates from private institutions, 19.4 per cent were either unemployed and looking for jobs, or in involuntary part-time or temporary employment. The figure was 7.9 per cent for graduates of autonomous universities and 3.8 per cent for post-NS polytechnic graduates.
There were 9,100 fresh graduates of full-time bachelor’s degree-level graduates across 26 private institutions, and of these, 40.8 per cent responded to the survey.
The survey focused on employment outcomes of economically active graduates from full-time bachelor’s-level external degree programmes.
Correction note: An earlier version of the story said the survey had 9,100 respondents, and this represented a 40.8 per cent response rate. This is incorrect. It should be that 40.8 per cent of the 9,100 fresh graduates across 26 private institutions responded. We are sorry for the error.
