There is a strong interest across the university and beyond in following and understanding the career paths of graduates. Following consultation with the graduate community, Graduate and Postdoctoral Studies in collaboration with the UBC Development and Alumni Engagement Office (DAE) devised a strategy to create and maintain a cross-campus database of PhD career outcomes. A successful feasibility pilot was carried out earlier in 2015, and Graduate Council, the Committee of Deans, and the Provost have subsequently fully supported rolling out the project across the university.
The first report on PhD Career Outcomes was published on April 13, 2017. The data can be accessed in a variety of ways:
- Report and visualizations on publicly available website with the ability to drill into the dataset.
- Static overview of outcomes for each PhD program, targeted at prospective students, in the G+PS degree program listing.
- Raw files for respective units have been distributed to all department heads, graduate advisors and Dean's Offices.
- A customized dashboard for faculty members that provides an automated overview and comparison of programs to Faculties and UBC overall.
Documentation of the project is available for UBC employees in the G+PS intranet.
G+PS is now evaluating tracking of master's students and Postdoctoral Fellows.