The economic downturn has caused a resurgence of interest among UCD graduates in traditionally secure career options such as teaching and the Civil Service, a new report has stated.
In its annual careers and appointments report, the college said there were substantial changes in the employment market in 2001. There was a decline in areas such as information technology, some engineering sectors and in consultancy jobs. In contrast, interest grew in teaching, the public service and professional training.
While UCD graduates performed strongly, competition for well-paid jobs was at an all-time high.
The report's author, Mr Colm Tobin, said: "It can be accepted that there is now greater competition for top graduate positions both here at home and abroad."
The other notable trend was the large increase in the numbers opting to remain in college to take a post-graduate course. This figure has been relatively stable in recent years, but it rose dramatically from 37 per cent in 2000 to 46.5 per cent in 2001.
Third-level observers said students appeared to be "waiting out" the economic downturn by taking post-graduate courses. While fees for these are high, students appear to favour this route rather than taking their chances in a depressed labour market.
The level of unemployment (1.7 per cent) among graduates remains extremely low in UCD, although this was the highest for some years. Because of the shift into post-graduate study, the number of UCD graduates in employment dropped from 54 per cent to 45.6 per cent.
UCD also provided a breakdown of unemployment rates across faculties. In 2001, the highest rate was in engineering, at 4 per cent. The next was among law graduates (2.8 per cent), followed by veterinary medicine at 2.4 per cent.
These figures are radically different to previous years. For example, no unemployment has been recorded among veterinary graduates for many years, while engineering graduates have experienced little unemployment during the last decade.
More worrying for prospective engineers was that even after taking a post-graduate course, the unemployment level went to 10 per cent.
In line with the expansion of the health service, the level of unemployment among medical graduates was zero.