Being able to graduate on a chosen course is said to be an enhancement of the student employability.
Higher Education enhances the priorities, challenges and skills of the graduates and having the right skills for the job and additional education, lot of opportunities will come into one’s way. The National Council for Higher Education (2014) defined tracer study as a quality assurance tool. Tracer studies, also called as Graduate Surveys are means of following graduates where they are and what they are doing after they received training or education in a Higher Education Institutions or HEI’s.
Common topics in a tracer study includes educational background or profile, employment status, reasons of taking the any degree course, skills learned and utilized during the first job and needed skills to develop. The National Council for Higher Education (2014) provided reasons why the need to conduct a tracer study is significant. Some of these are to find out what happened to graduates after they completed their studies; to find out if they are employed, self-employed or whether they are still looking for a job; to find out if their studies prepare them well for the workplace; to find out if graduates use the knowledge and skills they have learned during their studies; and to use graduates feedback to improve the quality of the study programs and more specific, to revise the curriculum, if necessary. This tracer study aims to help the University identify concurrence or mismatch between the training provided and the labor market. It is often asked if the Panpacific University is achieving satisfactory learning outcomes and/or value-added input to the society. To find solutions to these and other queries, this tracer study is designed to investigate the employability of graduates from the whole population of the University who graduated in AY: 2014-2015 to AY: 2016-2017. In addition, it focuses on the quality of higher education and the condition under which the graduates have been employed and its role in job-seeking, the length of time graduates took before getting employed and how their areas of work are related to the programs offered by the University.
Additionally, the study is expected to help identify if this program is still relevant to current market demands and the findings of the study are to inform future improvement as well as further studies. The tracer study conducted by Vong (2010) was done by the Quality Assurance Unit to inform program managers and/or heads of departments regarding the demands of the graduates and update management on employment conditions in Cambodian labor markets. Its findings was used to expand the existing programs at the University or introduce new programs related to changing market demands. Another study featured by Vong (2012) 2012 was made available for the public and it was done by the Quality Assurance Unit to verify the quality of higher education in this public University. The findings of the study helps the University identify its learning outcomes, and the relationships between education and the labor market needs.
To assure the effectiveness of the University programs, the study was conducted with two different units so that comparative information would be available. The comprehensive objectives of this study are to trace the Panpacific University Bachelor of Science in Accountancy graduates’ employment status and to find out on how they seek for they seek for their work, as well as their income and performance level at the workplace and how the program they had at Panpacific University helped them to get their job. Furthermore, this tracer study is done on purpose for us to know the kind and quality of education being provided by the Panpacific University to their students.
