Time to First Employment (A special reference to University of Kelaniya)

Abstract

Graduate Employability means that higher education alumni have developed the capacity to obtain work. The recent experience reveals that even talented graduates have to wait for a long time to be employed after the graduation. Under this circumstance, graduates’ unemployment has become a severe problem in Sri Lanka during the last few decades. Therefore, this study was conducted to investigate the relationship between graduates’ faculties and the time to first employment. The sample was chosen using stratified random sampling method. Under the proportional system, 5% of the total population was selected for the sample. The sample of the survey is only from the latest passed out 100 graduates of University of Kelaniya in 2017. Primary data was collected by giving questionnaires to the selected sample unit. Secondary data was obtained from the academic section of the University of Kelaniya and through literature survey. Collected data was analyzed using the SPSS software and MS Excel. Central tendency measures, Chi square test and Point & Interval estimation were used to analyze the data. Analyzed data was presented using tables and charts. According to the data analysis, the average time of getting the first employment of a graduate is about five months. According to the ANOVA table, P-value is 0.044. Hence it can be concluded that there is significant difference between average time to first employment and faculties at 95% confidence level. Finally, we could conclude that there is a difference between the faculty and time to first employment of graduates as per faculties