Transition to first employment: A survival analysis of university graduates from five cohorts

Nam Hoang Tran
International Center, Tokushima University, Tokushima 770-8502, Japan
Thuy Thi Hong Dang
Department of Educational Quality Assurance, Hanoi University, Hanoi 12109, Vietnam
Van Hong Nghiem
Faculty of Japanese Studies, Hanoi University, Hanoi 12109, Vietnam

Article ID: 4265

Keywords: graduate employability, higher education, non-technical graduates, survival analysis, time to employment

Abstract

Graduate employability research often evaluates whether graduates obtain jobs, but the duration required to secure the first job is an equally important indicator of labor market transition. This study applies survival analysis to examine time-to-employment among graduates of a public university in languages, social sciences, and humanities in Vietnam. Using graduate tracer survey data from five cohorts, Kaplan–Meier estimation and Cox proportional hazards regression were employed to analyze the timing of first employment and factors associated with faster labor market entry. The outcome variable was time from graduation to first employment, measured in ordered intervals, with unemployed graduates treated as right-censored observations. Among 657 graduates, 607 (92.4%) had obtained first employment by the time of the survey. Most graduates entered the labor market rapidly: 526 (80.1%) obtained their first job within less than three months after graduation, and the median time-to-employment category was the earliest interval. Kaplan–Meier comparisons showed no statistically significant subgroup differences by sex, supplementary training, job–major alignment, or cohort. However, the adjusted Cox model identified a significant cohort effect: compared with the 2020 cohort, the 2022 cohort had a lower hazard of first employment, indicating a slower transition into the labor market (HR = 0.695, 95% CI: 0.532–0.908, p = 0.0076). Other factors, including sex, job–major alignment, supplementary training, knowledge suitability, and skills suitability, were not statistically significant. This study advances Vietnamese graduate employability research by shifting the focus from static employment status to the timing of first employment and by demonstrating the value of survival analysis for examining cohort-sensitive school-to-work transitions when overall employment rates are high.

Published

2026-05-28

How to Cite

Tran, N. H., Dang, T. T. H., & Nghiem, V. H. (2026). Transition to first employment: A survival analysis of university graduates from five cohorts. Forum for Education Studies, 4(2). https://doi.org/10.59400/fes4265

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Vol. 4 No. 2 (2026)

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This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

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