Higher education: roles for doctoral graduates

‘What Do Researchers Do?' [What do researchers do? Doctoral graduate destinations and impact three years on (2010)] shows that 44% of UK-employed doctoral graduates were in the HE sector three and a half years after graduation, compared to 47% six months after graduation - a small movement away from the sector as careers progress, but not significant in terms of the large numbers who stay. This is the most important employment sector for doctoral graduates but the the data also shows that the majority of doctoral graduates do not enter academia but explore a wide range of careers outside the HE sector.

Doctoral graduates from recent years are known to have worked in the sector in the following profiled roles:

• Analytical chemists
• Biochemists
• Biologists
• Chemists
• Medical scientists
• Metallurgists and material scientists
• Microbiologists
• Pharmacologists
• Physicists
• Research psychologists
• Research mathematicians
• Social science, arts and humanities researchers