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Careers
An Office for National Statistics report, Graduates in the labour market, published in 2012, confirms that medicine and science degrees result in the highest pay for graduates. Median hourly earnings for all graduates aged 21 to 64 over the four quarters of 2011 was £15.18, 70% more than for non-graduates, which stood at £8.92. Focusing on degree subject studied, those with a degree in medicine or dentistry had the highest median earnings at £21.29; the second highest group, mathematical sciences, engineering, technology and architecture, had median earnings at £18.92: 120% more than non-graduates.
An earlier study, published in 2006 and carried out by PricewaterhouseCoopers LLP on behalf of Universities UK, also demonstrated that there are significant economic benefits, as well as substantial non-financial advantages, to obtaining a degree. For a graduate in mathematical or computer sciences, these amount to an additional £240,000 over a working lifetime, compared to an individual with two or more A levels.
Highly numerate graduates are desired in many different areas, including finance, accountancy and actuarial work. The mathematician's capacity to describe a complex situation in a form suitable for modelling is required in technically oriented disciplines such as meteorology, environmental science, trading, credit scoring and cryptography. Logical and analytical abilities are valued by many businesses, which employ mathematics graduates in analysis, strategy and management-consultancy roles. Furthermore, there is continued demand within the education sector, as teachers in primary and secondary schools, and in higher and further education.
The US CareerCast survey of the best ten jobs of 2011 lists Mathematician, Actuary and Statistician in positions two, three and four. An article published in the New York Times in August 2009 quotes the chief economist at Google as saying that the "sexy job in the next 10 years will be statisticians". The Royal Statistical Society has highlighted the many varied and exciting jobs available to graduates in mathematics and statistics.
The following websites provide a lot of useful information about careers using mathematics and statistics.
Employment Prospects
The latest data from HESA shows that Lancaster University performs excellently in the area of graduate employment. In 2010, the most recent year for which figures are available, 91.6% of those who graduated from full-time undergraduate study at Lancaster were in education or full-time employment within six months; the corresponding figure for the whole of the UK was 90.4%.
Careers Tutor
The department regularly receives information on maths-related jobs which is made available to final-year students. More general information on non-mathematical jobs and, in particular, graduate-recruitment schemes is available from the University's Careers Service.
The department's Careers Tutor, Dennis Prangle, liaises with the Careers Service to
- provide annual careers-planning talks throughout the degree programme;
- circulate job adverts and development opportunities which may be of interest to the department's students.
In addition, the department arranges various talks on maths-specific careers throughout the year, which not only help to inform students about possible options but also create links between employers and the department. The careers tutor is available to discuss careers questions with students on an individual basis.
Postgraduate Study
Lancaster has excellent opportunities for postgraduate study in Pure Mathematics, Statistics and Social Statistics. There are Masters courses run by the Postgraduate Statistics Centre and the new MSc in Quantitative Finance taught in collaboration with the Management School. Members of the department supervise students in our PhD programme, and the University has launched a Centre for Doctoral Training in Statistics and Operational Research, which will train at least 40 students over seven years; the first of these started with STOR-i in October 2010.
Adam
"I studied for the BSc Statistics at Lancaster and subsequently stayed on for another three years to do a PhD on the analysis of extreme sea levels. I very much enjoyed my time studying in the department – it’s a friendly place, the staff are approachable and the courses provided me with an excellent grounding for my subsequent studies and career."
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