This indicator is currently used in our Graduate Employability Ranking (see here for the methodology). It is comprised of two components:
- non-research partnership with employers
- research partnerships with employers (weighted 1.5 times higher)
The overall number of employers are calculated per faculty staff (FTE).
Non-research partnership with employers is designed to give insight into how active an institution is in partnering with companies to offer work experience, training, funding and internship opportunities. It's a reasonable expectation that the more official connections they have, the better equipped their graduates will be on the job market.
The measure we use is the number of distinct partnerships evidenced by the university in the recent 12-month period. The guidelines for this are below:
| Included | Excluded |
| Non-governmental companies and organisations that have an active partnership with your university to provide placements, internships, and training opportunities exclusively to your students. | Subsidiaries of companies. These should be included under the parent company. For example, 'Audible' comes under Amazon, and 'WeChat' comes under Tencent. |
| State owned enterprises are allowed | Universities and other academic organizations. |
| Parliamentary work is allowed (i.e. when it is related to the functioning of parliament, and not politically affiliated) | Governments |
Further definitions:
Internships are work experiences that correspond to a dedication of at least 8 hours per week, for a minimum period of 3 months. Work placements have the same minimum requirement, however, are generally unpaid.
Partnerships may include internship offers, fast-track job applications, summer internship offers, work placement opportunities, graduate scheme vacancies.