How did your law school fare?
Research undertaken by the Complete University Guide (CUG) has revealed which law schools produce the least employable graduates.
Taking data from the Higher Education Statistics Agency (HESA), a list of the top 100 law schools has been compiled. The 2017 edition — launched earlier this week — ranks law schools based on a number of criteria including “graduate prospects”.
Researchers looked at the number of law students who took up graduate level employment or further study after completing their law degree and gave each university a score out of 100.
According to the statistics, Canterbury Christ Church came bottom with a score of just 42.
Sunderland (43), Roehampton (44), Teeside (46), Winchester (47), West of Scotland (47), Edge Hill (47), East London (48) and Southampton Solent (49) all fell into the bottom 10 for law graduate employability.
However according to the guide a low score does not necessarily mean “graduates were unemployed”. The methodology notes state that some law graduates may be working in “low-level jobs such as shop assistants” and for research purposes were not included.
At the other end of the table — perhaps unsurprisingly — Cambridge University came in number one with a graduate prospects score of 93. However there was no place for Oxford in the top 10 who, receiving a score of just 83, finished in 11th place.
Researchers also provided each university with an overall score, taking into account not only “graduate prospects”, but also “entry standards”, “research quality” and “student satisfaction”.
Once again Cambridge came top of the table with a score of 100. The elite university was followed by Oxford in 2nd (98.3), UCL in 3rd (97.3), LSE in 4th (96.2) and King’s College London in 5th (95.3). Of the universities that provided researchers with data for all four categories, London Metropolitan (74.7) came bottom.
The biggest climbers in the overall standings year on year were Derby and Sheffield Hallam who both rose 17 places. The other universities to record double digit rises were Abertay (+12), Greenwich (+11) and Hull (+10).