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UK students lose job positions because of poor spelling

Thu, 10 Aug 2006
Over 75% of of employers in the UK would be put off a job candidate, whether graduate or undergraduate, by a students’ poor spelling or grammar.

A survey conducted by Hertfordshire University has found that bad and incorrect English separated just over 75% of the UK 515 companies it surveyed.

This figure is over double the 34% that would be annoyed by a student’s CV exaggerations.

In order to secure a job position, employers would be swayed by relevant work experience, according to over 46% of the employers questioned. Coming third to employers in important was a good work ethic – with 43% of employers considering this a key quality.

A Hertfordshire University spokesman said practical skills were essential in order to secure a job.

Surprisingly, only 24% of employers questioned have said they were placed a great merit of important on the class of degree achieved by the job candidate. A smaller minority, 14% of employers, said that the reputation of the university the student had attended would come into play.

Supporting this is the Confederation of British Industry survey, conducted last year, which suggested that just over 40% of employers were unhappy with reading, writing and numeracy skills among student school leavers at sixth form or GCSE level.