HKUST graduates of year 2008 remain much sought after in the employment market, with 98.3% of them having found jobs, started businesses, or pursued further studies by December 2008, according to the University's Graduate Employment Survey.
Among the 1,503 respondents to the Survey, 1,220 graduates (81.2%) have found full-time employment or started their businesses, 185 (12.3%) are pursuing full-time higher studies, and 56 (3.7%) were in temporary or part-time employment. Only 26 (1.7%) were unemployed at year-end.
"We are pleased that despite the tough economic conditions, the vast majority of our graduates have been able to find employment," said Prof Kar Yan Tam, Dean of Undergraduate Education.
He added that the university's internship programs and career counseling services for students had better equipped the students to meet the demand of the job market.
Commerce and Business remained the largest employment sector, taking up 76.5% (73.4% in 2007) of the full-time employed or self-employed graduates, followed by 8.5% (10.8% in 2007) in Manufacturing and Industries, 8.4% (7.0% in 2007) in Education, 2.7% (1.7% in 2007) in Community and Social Services, 2.2% (2.5% in 2007) in Government, and 1.7% (4.5% in 2007) in Construction.
In terms of job nature, the three most popular choices were Accounting / Auditing / Taxation (18.5%, up from 16.7% in 2007), Engineering (17.1%, up from 16.4% in 2007) and Banking / Finance (14.9%, down from 15.6% in 2007).
The mean gross monthly income of $14,461 was 6.3% higher than last year's $13,604. The median also increased from $12,000 to $12,675, representing a rise of 5.6%.
"We are glad to see an increase in the income levels. As the impact of the global financial tsunami is still looming, we encourage our students to be flexible in their job search and also to better equip themselves for the job market," Prof Tam said.
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