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The number of new graduate nurses in work is down on the same time last year at just under 74%, according to the latest graduate survey findings.

The annual graduate destination survey shows that 946 (73.6%) of last November graduates were nursing by March compared to 1004 (80%) at the same last year*.

Just under 1200 of the 1285 graduates who sat their state finals in November last year took part in the annual March survey by NETS (Nursing Education in the Tertiary Sector).

The survey found that 946 (73.6%) of the November graduates by March were reporting working as registered nurses either in New Zealand or overseas.  A further 222 (17.3%) were still job-hunting, 26 were not seeking work and 91 (7%) did not take part in the survey. When compared to last year's survey results it appears about 80 less graduates are employed than at the same time in 2015 – which was the highest graduate employment rate in recent years – and about an extra 30 are job hunting.

Jane Bodkin, the acting Chief Nursing Officer, said contributing to last year's record high in graduate employment was additional government funding for NETP (nursing entry to practice) and NESP (mental health) new graduate places in 2015. This year there was no additional funding available to support NETP placements in primary care or aged residential care (ARC) – as there had been in previous years through the Very Low Cost Access (VLCA) scholarships or the NETP ARC funding – and graduate employment had slipped back to a similar level to that recorded in 2014.

Bodkin said the Ministry of Health was aware that district health boards were continuing to recruit new graduates as vacancies arise and some DHBs had additional cohorts in April and May.  It also still expected this year to follow the previous years' trend of almost all graduates being employed within 12 months.

Dr Cathy Andrews, head of Ara's (the renamed CPIT) nursing school and the NETS executive member who compiled the annual survey statistics, said she believed 74% graduate employment within four months was actually a good news story when you compared with graduate employment from other degrees. She added that the close liaison between the South Island directors of nursing on strategies to employ as many new graduates as possible was also reflected in the high percentage of graduates from the four South Island programmes gaining jobs – ranging from 85 to 90 per cent.

The NETS data differs from job statistics released by the ACE new graduate placement programme as NETS surveys only November graduates and because it captures graduates who find jobs outside of the government-subsidised NETP and NESP new graduate positions offered through ACE, including jobs overseas.

The survey found that 13 graduates were overseas – the majority in Australia – but only three were overseas working as registered nurses. This compares to the survey results in 2013 showing 38 new graduates overseas  

*Last year's total of 1004 was an aggregate total of the 930 who reported they were nursing in the NETS survey (that did not include results from AUT graduates) plus the addition of Ministry of Health data that showed that 74 of the 104 AUT graduates were employed in new graduate programmes by March.