The Rookies just completed it's latest international survey of students and recent graduates from the best art schools around the world. 776 students answered our extensive questions and provided a great insight into whether it's worth spending the money on an education.
The good news is, that the results were mostly in favour of getting a higher education. Obviously there are a huge number of factors at play here, but for the most part students genuinely felt happy with their course, the facilities, the lecturers and their chance of employment.
As in all surveys there were still a number of students that were very unhappy with their experience. Many felt they were not prepared for a job and still needed a lot of time to further prepare themselves for the industry.
Some of our biggest takeaways we discovered were:
- vast majority of students would recommend their school.
- most students got a Bachelors Degree rather than a Certificate or Diploma.
- most students spend 3 years or more achieving their degree.
- majority of students were happy with the staff at their school.
- 40+ hours per week is spent studying and learning.
- students felt they lacked industry techniques.
- students felt they lacked business skills the most.
- students want much more industry involvement and networking events.
- most students still lacked soft skills required to get a job.
- majority of students expect a salary of $25-$50K.
- vast majority of students felt they were ready for employment
- over half of all students want to work at big studios.
- most students have about $25-$50K debt after graduation.
- Maya, Zbrush, Substance and Nuke were the most popular tools at school.
Shown below is an infographic with a detailed analysis of the some of the data we collected. Most of the additional data will be used internally and to help advise schools and studios how to continue to work together and build curriculums and jobs that compliment each other.
