Student Spotlight: Postsecondary Enrolments and Graduate Outcomes

Author: NB-IRDT Staff

Posted on 14 Jan 2021

From May to August 2020, NB-IRDT hosted the very first Pathways to Professions: an experiential learning program that provided six UNB students with hands-on workplace experience and training in research methods and job readiness. Each month, our Student Spotlight series will highlight some of the students’ research findings on the population demographics and economic progress of New Brunswick.

From 2018 to 2027, New Brunswick is projected to have 120,000 job openings across the province, leading to concerns over an impending labour market shortage alongside increasing youth outmigration. Education, however, may offer a solution.

Education serves as a vehicle for social and economic progress. Practices such as targeting postsecondary enrolments could help address the impending labour market gap, and evaluating the changes in STEM and non-STEM enrolments could help inform policies to support growth and identify where future skill shortages may lie.

This summer, Pathways to Professions student Nihla Hussain examined the evolution of postsecondary enrolments and graduate outcomes in NB according to gender, age group, and student status, with her analysis of graduate employment income illustrating the income discrepancies affecting minority groups.

Read the full report

Meet the Researcher

Nihla Hussain is a third-year Biology-Chemistry student at UNB, originally from Bangladesh and currently living in Saint John, NB. She has aspirations to combine her passion for STEM with humanitarian work and contribute to socioeconomic progress, and she credits Pathways to Professions with helping her build an analytical toolkit for research.

Interested in becoming involved with Pathways to Professions? Email nb-irdttraining@unb.ca to learn how.