{"id":8809,"date":"2021-05-26T11:08:00","date_gmt":"2021-05-25T23:08:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/?p=8809"},"modified":"2021-05-26T12:00:30","modified_gmt":"2021-05-26T00:00:30","slug":"how-covid-19-has-affected-the-careers-of-doctoral-graduates-in-nz","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/?p=8809","title":{"rendered":"How COVID-19 Has Affected the Careers of Doctoral Graduates in NZ"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The University of Otago, in conjunction with five other New Zealand universities, has conducted a wide-ranging research project on how COVID-19 has impacted the careers of doctoral graduates. The six participating NZ universities invited recent doctoral graduates to participate in a survey (thanks to those from AUT who did!). Over 400 recent graduates completed the survey, and initial results have now been compiled.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In addition to showing how COVID has affected the careers of existing <\/em>doctoral graduates, they also hint at ongoing impacts on those who are yet to graduate. So: how has COVID affected the careers of doctoral graduates?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Career plans<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

60% of doctoral graduates surveyed felt that their career plans had been impacted by COVID-19; and the nature of these impacts was generally negative. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Although significant, this proportion is lower than in a comparable international study conducted by Nature<\/em><\/a>, which found that up to 86% of respondents felt their career plans had been negatively impacted by COVID (with 61% sure and 25% unsure). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This indicates that, while post-doctoral careers in NZ are comparatively sheltered, most graduates still had some change of plans. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Job offers rescinded<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

19% of respondents had a job offer rescinded due to COVID-19. International students were far more affected than domestic students in this regard. In the Nature<\/em> survey<\/a>, up to 34% had had a job offer rescinded (with 13% sure that their experience was due to COVID-19, and another 21% unsure as to the reason why their offer was rescinded). <\/p>\n\n\n\n

What does this mean?<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

The job market for doctoral graduates is clearly tougher in a global pandemic. Initial comparisons between the NZ data and the global study in Nature <\/em>indicate that NZ doctoral graduates are in a slightly better position than those elsewhere in the world. However, international students who have graduated from NZ universities are feeling the effects more than their domestic student colleagues. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Qualitative comments (which have yet to be fully analysed) seem to indicate themes of uncertainty, with many respondents re-training or altering their academic trajectory. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This study will be longitudinal, and further insights will emerge as the study continues. For now though, it appears that COVID-19 has (perhaps unsurprisingly) significantly disrupted the careers of new doctoral graduates. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

Special thanks to Professor Rachel Spronken-Smith and Dr Kim Brown of the University of Otago\u2019s Graduate Research School, together with co-researchers from the other universities for sharing these survey results with us in advance of publication.<\/em><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The University of Otago, in conjunction with five other New Zealand universities, has conducted a wide-ranging research project on how COVID-19 has impacted the careers of doctoral graduates. The six […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":25632,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[30,8],"tags":[76,200,140,13,117],"class_list":["post-8809","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-authentic","category-category-3","tag-careers","tag-covid-19","tag-doctorate","tag-research","tag-survey"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p83npQ-2i5","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8809","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/25632"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8809"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8809\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8819,"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8809\/revisions\/8819"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8809"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8809"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/thesislink.aut.ac.nz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8809"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}