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In the UK, the vast majority of university students specialise and study just one subject at bachelor degree level, commonly known in the UK as a single honours degree. However, nearly all British universities will permit students if they wish to study two or even three subjects, so-called joint or combined honours degrees, internationally known as a double major. The purpose of this paper is to explore whether the study of a joint rather than a single honours degree had an impact on employment outcomes six months after graduation.

The authors analysed the complete data set provided from the Higher Education Statistics Agency Destination of Leavers from the Higher Education survey. The data were analysed to establish whether there was a difference in the highly skilled graduate employability of the joint honours students. The authors established whether there were any differences inherent in completing a joint honours degree in a post-1992 higher education institution, by nation within the UK or within a Russell Group higher education institution.

The authors found an approximately consistent 3 per cent point negative gap nationally in the highly skilled employment rates of joint compared with single honours graduates. This gap was at its lowest in the highly selective Russell Group universities (−1.52 per cent points) and highest in post-1992, vocationally oriented universities (−7.13 per cent points) and in Northern Ireland universities (−12.45 per cent points). Joint honours graduates of Scottish universities fared well, with a +3.09 per cent point advantage over the national average for joint honours. The authors found that universities that had a higher proportion of joint honours graduates generally had a lower employability gap between their joint and single honours graduates.

This study focussed on joint honours degrees in the UK where the two or three principal subjects fall into different JACS subject areas, i.e. the two or three subjects are necessarily diverse rather than academically cognate. Future work will consider the class of joint honours degrees where the principal subjects lie within the same JACS subject area, i.e. they may be closer academically, although still taught by different academic teams. This grouping will include, for example, pairs of foreign languages, some social sciences pairings such as politics and sociology, and pairings such as history and theology from the historical and philosophical subject area.

The potential disbenefits of studying for a joint honours degree are apparent in this study. Joint honours students may face organisational, academic and cultural challenges that require a positive, conscious and sustained effort to overcome, on both the part of the student and the higher education institution. In particular for graduates of the post-1992 universities, it appears that there is a negative relative impact on highly skilled employment. This impact is lessened if the university is Scottish (four-year degrees with in-built breadth of study) or where the proportion completing joint honours degrees is relatively high.

In the UK, the majority of university students specialise and study just one subject at bachelor degree level, commonly known in the UK as a single honours degree. However, nearly all British universities will permit students if they wish to study two or even three subjects, so-called joint or combined honours degrees, internationally known as a double major. The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationship between graduate employment, pre-university educational attainment and degree classification achieved. The study also explored student choice with respect to university prestige.

The authors analysed the complete data set provided from the Higher Education Statistics Agency Destination of Leavers from the Higher Education survey, and combined this with data from the POLAR4 quintiles, Universities and Colleges Admissions Service (UCAS) tariff points and degree classification. The data were analysed to establish whether there was a difference in the choices and highly skilled graduate employment of the joint honours students, focussing particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities, in order to build on previous published work.

For any UCAS tariff band, the higher the POLAR4 quintile the higher the rate of highly skilled destination. Russell Group outperform the Post-92 graduates in their rates of highly skilled destinations, for any tariff band and for both joint and single honours degrees. Higher POLAR4 quintile graduates are more likely to study at the Russell Group, with this effect increasing the higher the UCAS tariff. With the exception of first class honours graduates from Post-92 universities, joint and single honours from the Russell Group have a higher rate of highly skilled destination than Post-92 in the next higher degree classification.

Low POLAR4 quintile students with high UCAS tariffs are “under-matching” and there is an impact on their graduate employment as a result.

This study adds new insights into joint honours degrees and also reinforces the literature around educational advantage and achievement prior to university, and the impact on graduate employment. Educational disadvantage persists over the course of a university degree education, from the perspective of gaining graduate employment. Higher quintile graduates are proportionately more likely to achieve the highest degree classifications, and proportionately less likely to achieve the lowest classifications, than graduates from the lower quintiles. Joint honours graduates are less likely to achieve a first class honours degree than single honours, and this will affect their rate of highly skilled destination.

In the UK, the majority of university students specialise and study just one subject at bachelor degree level, commonly known in the UK as a single honours degree. However, nearly all British universities will permit students if they wish to study two or even three subjects, so-called joint or combined honours degrees, internationally known as a double major. The purpose of this paper is to explore whether educational advantage, measured by the “Participation of Local Areas” (POLAR) classification, correlated with rates of graduate destinations for joint and single honours graduates. This study focused particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities.

The authors analysed the complete data set provided from the Higher Education Statistics Agency Destination of Leavers from the Higher Education survey, and combined this with data from the POLAR4 quintiles, which aggregate geographical regions across the UK based on the proportion of its young people that participate in higher education. The data were analysed to establish whether there was a difference in the highly skilled graduate employability of the joint honours students, focusing particularly on Russell Group and Post-92 Universities, in order to build on previous published work.

Single honours and joint honours graduates from higher participation POLAR4 quintiles were more likely to be in a highly skilled destination. However at both the Russell Group and the Post-92 universities, respectively, there was no trend towards a smaller highly skilled destinations gap between the honours types for the higher quintiles. For the highest POLAR4 quintile, the proportion of joint honours graduates was substantially higher at the Russell Group than at Post-92 universities. Furthermore, in any quintile, there were proportionately more joint honours graduates from the Russell Group, compared with single honours graduates, and increasingly so the higher the quintile.

This study focused on joint honours degrees in the UK where the two or three principal subjects fall into different Joint Academic Coding System (JACS) subject areas, i.e. the two or three subjects are necessarily diverse rather than academically cognate. This excluded the class of joint honours degrees where the principal subjects lie within the same JACS subject area, i.e. they may be closer academically, although still taught by different academic teams. However, the overall proportion of joint honours graduates identified using the classification was in line with the UCAS (2017) data on national rates of combined studies acceptances.

All Russell Group graduates, irrespective of their POLAR4 quintile, were far more likely to be in a highly skilled destination than single or joint honours graduates of Post-92 universities. Even the lowest quintile graduates of the Russell Group had greater rates of highly skilled destination than the highest quintile from Post-92 universities, for both single and joint honours graduates. This demonstrated the positive impact that graduating from the Russell Group confers on both single and joint honours graduates.

This study could not explain the much smaller gap in the highly skilled destinations between single honours and joint honours graduates found in the Russell Group, compared with the Post-92. Why do a higher proportion of joint honours graduates hail form the upper POLAR4 quintiles, the Russell Group joint honours graduates were more disproportionately from the upper POLAR4 quintiles and the joint honours upper POLAR4 quintiles represented such a larger proportion of the Russell Group overall undergraduate population? Other student characteristics such as tariff on entry, subjects studied, gender, age and ethnicity might all contribute to this finding.

This study demonstrated that, averaged across all universities in the UK, there was a trend for both single honours and joint honours graduates from higher participation POLAR4 quintiles to be more likely to be in a highly skilled destination, i.e. the more educationally advantaged, were more likely to be in a highly skilled destination, as a proportion of the total from each honours type. This accorded with HESA (2018b) data, but expanded those findings to include direct consideration of joint honours graduates.

In this second of two articles, the author examines the implications of demographic and social trends for Library and Information Studies Schools including present and future demand and supply for training. The response of the Schools by way of course changes and recruitment policies is discussed. The market for information professionals will also be affected when there is greater competition for new graduate labour. Ways of tackling the skills shortage could include: tied contracts, providing better prospects for women, increasing staff training and benefit packages, improving the image of the profession, and exploiting alternative sources of labour.

Throughout the 1980s, UK retailers have sought competent managers of graduate calibre for their management training programmes. Most of these graduates were non‐specialists recruited from a variety of higher education establishments. In recent years, however, a number of institutions have provided specialist retail courses to meet the needs of industry. Currently five degree programmes are in operation with two others due for approval in 1990/1991. The main features of each of these undergraduate courses are reviewed.

In recent years Management Studies has moved from the post‐graduate level to the area of major importance for Universities and Colleges: the undergraduate teaching of students. The prospective student may see the subject entitled Business Studies or Management Studies at the various institutions of higher education; and he or she would be advised to consider both University and Polytechnic courses before making a final choice.

This is the season of examination results and there are three pioneer ventures in education for librarianship which have come to fruition this summer. The College of Librarianship Wales reports 25 graduates from their joint honours degree with the University of Wales. Most of the new graduates will be taking up posts in Britain, but two are going overseas, to Norway and Zambia, and several are proceeding to a masters degree.

To investigate the attitudes of academic staff towards providing practical support for full‐time students working on a part‐time basis during term‐time.

A case study of a rural faculty of a large metropolitan university in the UK. In‐depth semi‐structured interviews were held with 22 members of staff, drawn from every department in the case study faculty.

Support for working students is arbitrary and accidental. The majority of staff are unaware of the extent of student employment and of the possibilities of providing support.

Only a small proportion of the total university staff were interviewed, coupled with the fact that the faculty is rural and therefore the sample may not be representative of the majority of universities which have city centre campuses.

Improved awareness of students' total university experience on the part of academics may encourage practical measures to assist the undergraduates to cope more effectively with their dual roles of student and worker. However, some forms of support, such as greater flexibility in the timetable, may be very difficult, if not impossible, to accommodate.

No other research appears to have been carried out in the UK on this topic.

This paper aims to determine why so many banks do not recognize in a timely manner the inherent risks and imbalances with their risk/reward decision trade-offs, to elevate the risk conversation by embracing a more strategic and adaptive behavioral perspective and to show how an effective risk management organizational mindset is a definite solution for mitigating risk.

A direct-mail questionnaire survey was designed with the unit of analysis US community bank (under US$1.5bn in assets) and its risk performance. We used quantitative methods using previously tested scales for main constructs and FDIC bank data for performance measures. To gauge the models capacity for determining discriminatory value, results were also measured against relative peer financial performance.

The findings established that an effective risk management process that assimilates risk tolerance, risk propensity and risk practices into a managerial mindset offers a sound solution for mitigating risk. By envisioning risk as a “conceptual model of thinking” and interpreting it as a “predictable business process”, and by offering specific “decision enablers” that complement the corporate mindset, it creates a safety net against unsafe risk practices. As a result, it allows for an appreciation that current financial performance is a direct measure of management’s risk decision capabilities.

The sample size (n = 151), although adequate for our purpose was relatively small, was restricted to US community banks (less than US$1.5bn in assets) and single-informants (CEOs), thereby providing a somewhat narrow focus. Also, the survey was conducted during a slow economic period, and results may be different during a growth period. We see ripe opportunity for further research, especially related to money-center and regional banks and the next level of management as well as the behavioral influences that frame the risk/reward opportunity. Research on other industries, small businesses, etc., would be valuable because risk permeates all decisioning.

From a practitioner perspective, providing guidance on risk oversight allows for improved financial performance. The findings should be of interest to financial industry leaders, policy makers and regulators as understanding how an active orientation of risk tolerance, risk propensity and risk practices are coordinated across the organization is vital. Also, managers need to understand how characteristics of risk management manifest itself within their organization in terms of productivity and financial performance.

This paper is the first comprehensive empirical study that incorporates a conceptual approach that uses outcome history, behavioral influences and operational dimensions to identify risk management capabilities in community banks designed to increase risk/reward awareness.

The surging demand for higher education in Africa for expedited socio-economic growth and global sustainable development demands customising gains made elsewhere for local benefit through quality provision. This study contributes to local and international discourses on the refinement of results-based university learning content determination on the lines of the Bologna Process, and advocates the development of situationally relevant curricula for successful national advancement in Zimbabwe.

The qualitative study uses records and documentary analysis, interviews and meetings with key participants involved in shaping academic processes at one of the country's young and fragile universities. The introspective research approach enabled the cumulative experiential and reflective contributions of participants to shape both the dialogue and follow-up action on the adoption of minimum bodies of knowledge in university curriculum reform.

Participants celebrated efforts to pit harmonisation alongside autonomy in academic discourses, and suggested improvements on the mechanisms to define policy and operational frameworks for diversely-oriented academic establishments. They lauded and interrogated the discourse around minimum bodies of knowledge, calling for further critical research and analysis for defining clarity on its harmonisation function.

This paper traverses the rapidly expanding Zimbabwe higher education system's endeavours to regulate mandates and operations, in pursuit of relevance, quality and excellence and examines stakeholder efforts at determining streamlined university curricula. It contributes uniquely to collective regulation of multiple institutions towards quality academic agendas that underpin the life-long competences of the institutions' graduates.