Half of BIUST graduates get employment
While there is rampant unemployment among university graduates in Botswana, it has emerged that 48 percent of graduates of Botswana International University of Science and Technology (BIUST) are employed within a period of six months.
This is revealed in its 2021/22 annual report of the university which says this demonstrates the academic prowess of the institution and employment readiness of its graduates.
“Forty-eight percent of our graduates are employed within six months of graduation,” BIUST states in its annual report.
The report says BIUST’s reconfigured learning programmes produce market-relevant programmes which include Financial Mathematics, Mechatronics, Actual Sciences, Forensic Sciences, Cyber Security and Biotechnological Sciences, amongst others.
It notes that BIUST has upgraded all its learning programmes from Bachelors to include Honours Degree qualifications, making its graduates more attractive to the global community. According to the report, academic curricula for the undergraduate programmes cover courses that equip the students with business management, entrepreneurship and other soft skills needed for the students to be well rounded Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) graduates, which is a differentiating factor to brand the BIUST graduate.
It states that this is enabled by the fact that BIUST academic staff are PhD holders with a track record of research and varied professional experience and renowned locally or globally as practitioners in a specific field or have made impactful contributions to their domains of experience. The report notes that during the period under review, BIUST had set itself a target of graduation levels of 85 percent for degree, 65 percent for master’s and 40 percent for doctorate programmes.
The performance achieved for each level of graduation was 66 percent, 17 percent, and 24 percent respectively.
“As means of enhancing output of the post-graduate students, the university will expedite the comprehensive operationalisation of the School of Graduate Studies,” reads the annual report.
During the 2021/22 financial year, the university enrolled 1956 students, which was a 91 percent performance against a target of 2140. According to the report, BIUST’s student retention strategy played a major role in the attainment of this performance level.
It states that the university managed to attract and retain 1576 undergraduate students and 380 post-graduate students. Of these, 156 were international students.
“In terms of employability rate, 48 percent of students were employed during the 2021/22 fiscal year against a target of 68 percent,” the report says.