Continuing our feature on original QS Research, reflecting the minds and intentions of postgraduate applicants around the world, we continue our theme and review what motivates students to apply to grad school.
A couple of decades ago, intellectual curiosity made up a large part of the motivation to seek a further degree beyond a bachelor’s qualification. Local and international students alike pursues masters and research programmes more often that not because they had a real passion for a subject and sought to extend their knowledge in the area. Now, the changing dynamics of the global postgraduate scene – higher fees, fewer loans and financial aid schemes and an increasing level of undergraduate debt – have impacted directly on why students want to study at the higher level. The days of intellectual development as the primary factor behind the motivation to study a postgraduate programme seem to have disappeared.
The QS Research, based on a survey of more that 1,500 postgraduate applicants, clearly indicates how respondents cite reasons related to improving career prospects (70%), learning new skills (57%) and enabling career change (35%) over and above other, what some might term “softer” reasons for moving into the postgraduate arena. With the growth of master’s degrees in particular areas such as business, economics, finance, law and management, the reasons for studying are of course no surprise. With vocational subjects being amongst the most popular in the world today, the decision to pursue such topics to tend to relate more directly than ever with careers – change and development – depending on your individual circumstances.
| Study Motivation | No. of Responses | Percentage | |
| To improve career prospects | 1009 | 70 | |
| To learn new skills | 823 | 57 | |
| To enable a career change | 503 | 35 | |
| Primarily for education | 391 | 27 | |
| To boost salary | 391 | 27 | |
| To start own business | 331 | 23 | |
| Other | 50 | 3 |
From the research we see that only 27% wish to improve their education, for either educational or intellectual reasons at the postgraduate level. For the reasons given above, this is no surprise but it nevertheless underlines one of the major changes in the postgraduate world today – reading a degree at this level is the result of focused reasoning and research and a definite decision that such investment will surely bring returns for the future.