story | Dion Ho, Senior Writer
Cover photo | Dion Ho, Senior Writer
Photo | Dion Ho, Senior Writer
Fresh graduates from Yale-NUS College’s inaugural class recorded an employment rate of 93.3% and a median starting salary of S$3,500. This is based on the latest Graduate Employment Survey 2017, which was conducted by the five Autonomous Universities in Singapore: Nanyang Technological University (NTU), National University of Singapore (NUS), Singapore Management University (SMU), Singapore Institute of Technology (SIT), and Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD). The Straits Times also reported that the median monthly salary amongst fresh graduates from NUS, NTU and SMU is $3,400, with an employment rate of 88.9%.
106 out of a total of 119 fresh graduates from the Yale-NUS class of 2017 participated in the joint survey. This is the first time Yale-NUS is participating in the survey.
According to the survey, the median starting salary of Yale-NUS graduates with Bachelor of Science with Honours degrees is S$4,083, while that for graduates with Bachelor of Arts with Honours degrees is S$3,500. Within NUS, the median income of Yale-NUS graduates with Bachelor of Science and Bachelor of Arts degrees are ranked fourth and sixteenth respectively.
Yale-NUS graduates went into diverse industries in the public and private sectors. The top six industries are: business and management consultancy; financial and insurance; information and communication; education; public administration and defense; and arts, entertainment and recreation.
Professor Tan Tai Yong, President of Yale-NUS College, expressed his delight at the outcome of the survey. He said, “Our Class of 2017 students have demonstrated that they are pioneers in more ways than one: from entering the first liberal arts college in Singapore and helping to shape the school culture for the future cohorts, to blazing the trail for future Yale-NUS graduates in the workplace.” He reaffirmed Yale-NUS’ goal “to nurture future global leaders by equipping them with global perspectives and critical thinking, while imbuing in them an ethic of service.”
In its press release, Yale-NUS Public Affairs highlighted the three graduates from the Class of 2017: Linus Seah, Michael James Anthony, and Nicholas Carverhill. The three graduates majored in Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE), Mathematical, Computational and Statistical Sciences (MCS), and Urban Studies respectively. Mr. Seah joined the pharmaceutical company GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) Asia and is currently a management trainee in the GSK Future Leaders Programme. Mr. Anthony, on the other hand, joined the public sector: he is a Country Officer in the Singapore’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ (MFA) Australia, New Zealand and the Pacific (ANZP) Directorate. Finally, Mr. Carverhill attained the Rhodes Scholarship and is pursuing a Master of Philosophy in Development Studies at the University of Oxford.
Mr Seah said: “A benefit of the liberal arts education I received is the training of ‘intellectual plasticity’, or more plainly put, the ability to pick up things and apply them quickly. In procurement where I’m given little time to understand an entire category or commodity, the training that I’ve received in college has definitely helped”.
The latest Graduate Employment Survey results published by the Singapore Ministry of Education can be found on their website. The information for each tertiary institution can be found here: NUS, NTU, SMU, SUTD, SIT.