Wonkhe SUs · Weekly webinars · 4 November 2026
What SUs can do to help students get a job
Sharanya Sivarajah on what 18,590 students told us about career preparation – and why SUs, not careers services, sit closest to the biggest lever in the data.
Checking your subscription…
One moment while we confirm your access to this recording.
Students keep telling SUs that employability is their top priority, and most SUs respond with a careers fair, a CV workshop or a LinkedIn headshot day – only for the same priority to top the survey again the following year. Sharanya Sivarajah sets out why, starting with a political mood that has moved away from universities, a Budget that offers students and graduates little, a graduate premium that has fallen in the UK but nowhere else, and a recovering but uneven graduate jobs market. Drawing on Wonkhe polling of 18,590 students across 178 providers, the session shows that over a third of students can’t say their time at university is preparing them for a career – and that the strongest predictor of career confidence isn’t subject, provider or the careers service but belonging. That puts SUs closest to the lever, and the session closes with what SUs can build themselves, what they should demand of their university, and four things to start on Monday.
What we cover
- Why employability keeps topping SU priority votes, and why the usual careers fair response doesn’t shift it
- The politics – Burnham, NEETs, voters ranking universities last, and the bidding war on employer National Insurance
- What Budget 2026 means for students and graduates, from the Plan 2 freeze to an 18-month Graduate route
- Why the graduate premium fell in the UK but held or rose in the US, Canada, France, Spain and the Netherlands
- Graduate hiring in 2026, competition for internships and AI in recruitment
- UUK’s Future jobs roadmap, and why the fight is over what counts as work-based learning
- The four groups – Destination-Clear, Cautious Optimists, Drifters and the Disconnected
- Why belonging moves career confidence more than anything else, and the link with wellbeing
- The international PGT paradox – the most confident cohort with the weakest outcomes
- Reach beats richness – the three tiers, departmental beats central, and the degree not the module
- What SUs can build – subject-level careers activity, student-run ventures, developmental roles and alumni
- What SUs can demand – credit for participation, credited work experience, the diploma supplement and support for international students
- Where to start on Monday
Things to read
- The engine of employability is relational, not informational
- Where does this degree take me? – Wonkhe report
- Students say employability is their top priority – what can SUs do about it?
- If the graduate premium is falling, supply-side tinkering won’t bring it back
- A slightly better outlook for graduate jobs
- UUK’s work experience target forgets that most students already have some
- What’s in Alan Milburn’s NEET report for the higher education sector?
- What Budget 2026 means for students, graduates, universities and SUs
- What SUs in England need to know about graduate retention as mayors gain new powers
- Course it’s not the careers service
- Ten things academic communities could do for students and their SUs
- Careers, credit and curricula – examples of practice from European SUs and unis
- Can students use their work experience and/or part-time job to count towards their degree?
- What do students on placement get for their money?
- Euro unis are using diploma supplements to recognise student volunteer roles – and the UK could too
- What is a “non-academic transcript” and should SUs be paying attention?
- Students are developing amazing skills through the SU (if they can uncover them)
- A new report is out on employment disadvantage and here’s what SUs need to know
- Are we letting international students down on employability?
- Four in five international students are shopping around, and graduate jobs are what will win them