Postgraduate applications jump by up to 20% as Covid and economic jitters shrink employment options
Thousands of students are applying to study “panic master’s” courses after getting no response to their job applications in the shrinking pool of graduate roles.
Universities including UCL, Cambridge and Edinburgh, told the Observer they were seeing substantial increases, ranging between 10 and 20%, in the number of UK students applying to study for postgraduate degrees in the autumn.
Mary Curnock Cook, an admissions expert who is chairing an independent commission on students, said the rise is due to “a collapse in confidence in the graduate employment market”. There is a backlog of applications from graduates who struggled to secure roles last year or whose placements were cancelled, she said.
