Social sciences more attractive for postgraduate applicants: Report

Majors related to social sciences have been increasingly more attractive than science and engineering for postgraduate candidates, according to a report released on Thursday.

The report, released on education information platform eol.cn ahead of the annual postgraduate entrance examination, mainly aims to explore the status quo of postgraduate enrollment in China.

Finance, law, journalism and communication, as well as business management, have been the most sought-after majors in the past few years, the report showed.

For example, the enrollment ratio of pedagogy has increased by nearly 5 percentage points from 2000 to 2017, according to the report.

Engineering, on the other hand, has become less popular although it still saw the highest enrollment ratio among all academic fields.

The enrollment ratio of science and engineering dropped by nearly five and eight percentage points, respectively, from 2000 to 2017, statistics showed.

For example, among the top 10 most popular majors at Shandong University in 2018, one was engineering, while the other nine belong to social sciences.

Many postgraduate engineering programs hardly enrolled the number of students planned, and the admittance score line for science and engineering in general has been decreasing.

The report analysis showed that many students majoring in engineering don't want to pursue a master's degree because a bachelor's degree is enough to get them a good job.

However, for social science majors, even if they graduate from top universities, they are not guaranteed a good job because the major itself is less competitive, which also is a main force for further education, according to the report.