The number of new graduate nurse jobs has stayed static at around 900 for the third year running, despite the number of nursing graduates growing 25 per cent in the same time period.
The annual graduate destination survey shows that while a bumper crop of 1323 registered nurses graduated in November 2013, the number of jobs has not grown to match, resulting in more new graduates than ever still job-hunting.
Graduate employment reached a heady 85 per cent for the 1050 nurses graduating in November 2011 before dropping to 75 per cent for November 2012’s 1209 graduates and has now slumped to 69 per cent for the November 2013 graduates.
For the second year running, the survey, coordinated by nurse educator organisation NETS, asked graduates without jobs whether they were actively looking for work.
The survey found that 909 (69 per cent) were employed as registered nurses, 268 (20 per cent) were actively seeking work, 51 (4 per cent) were not actively seeking work, and 95 (7 per cent) didn’t respond to the survey.
The number employed in district health board medical or surgical wards dropped by 50, while the number employed in primary health care (including practice nursing) grew from 67 to 101 and the number finding jobs in ‘continuing care elderly’ grew from 81 to 115.
The number nursing overseas fell from 38 a year ago to 24 this year, with the highest numbers working overseas being Otago Polytechnic graduates, with seven graduates nursing overseas.
The job-hunting success rates for nursing schools ranged from 60 to 89 per cent, and despite well-publicised restrictions last year on new graduate jobs in Dunedin Hospital, 76 per cent of Otago Polytechnic graduates are in nursing jobs. In addition, despite calls to increase the Pacific nursing workforce, 44 per cent of Whitireia’s Bachelor of Nursing (Pacific) graduates were still job-hunting in March.
