Most sought after STEM skills in SA

Alex Rose-Innes

Recently, many of South Africa’s biggest companies such as Discovery, FNB, Nedbank and Shoprite, said that they are looking for Science, Technology, Engineering and Maths (STEM) and IT skills.

No Lack of Career Opportunities

Currently STEM skills are among the most sought-after when it comes to employment. Employers favour these abilities because STEM subjects lay a foundation for critical thinking and problem-solving and build competency and literacy in what is fast becoming the language of the world.

Robert Zwane, senior executive of national imperatives at the South African Institute of Chartered Accountants (SAICA), says that for scarce-skills professions such as chartered accountancy, bridging the shortcomings in SA’s education system is a strategic priority and it is not up to government alone to tackle this. “To address the problems relating to quality education and skills development, we need to collaborate on programmes that pool together our knowledge and skills. This is especially true when it comes to maths and we need to stress the message to youths that maths matters.

SAICA’s Thuthuka initiative, launched in 2002, is now a well-established and highly successful national transformation scheme, running more than 40 projects annually; consisting of two parts – the Thuthuka Education Upliftment Fund (TEUF) and the Thuthuka Bursary Fund (TBF). The programme has already reached more than 1 million learners, providing education-focused and community-based projects to learners and educators from previously disadvantaged backgrounds with the dual aim of encouraging learners at high school to take maths as subject and improving the pass rate of this gateway subject. Among the key school programmes are accounting olympiads, business roadshows and symposiums and development camps for maths and accounting skills.

Deloitte offers several programmes aimed at high school and university students, as well as graduate programmes for actuarial sciences, chartered accountancy and data science. “We help students understand that being an engineer, mathematician, statistician, economist or various other STEM professions could lead to exciting opportunities in the professional services field,” says Deloitte managing partner (Africa talent and transformation), Justine Mazzocco.

Among the company’s initiatives is a tutorship programme, Project Siyakhula, which sees Deloitte professionals tutor maths and accounting to Grade 10, 11 and 12 learners from schools in Ivory Park and the Young Executives Programme, a two-day initiative that introduces high school learners to a career in chartered accountancy. Deloitte also offers a bursary programme, spending more than R16 million per annum on direct bursaries to learners already studying towards a chartered accountancy qualification.

Valuing the significance of science and maths education at high school level, Investec supports both the Promaths initiative and a maths and science teacher internship programme called SAMSTIP. Now in its 15th year, Promaths aims to facilitate maths and science lessons for learners. To date, more than 8 000 school children from township and rural areas have been through the programme, many of them achieving exceptional results. In 2019, out of the 1 392 learners who matriculated from Investec-funded Promaths centres, 224 distinctions in maths and 459 distinctions in science were achieved.

Investec also has a bursary scheme, in partnership with Study Trust. There are currently 100 students on full-cost bursaries at various universities across SA. Investec bolsters this with mentorship, pairing each bursary recipient with an Investec employee.

Doing its bit to secure the talent pipeline, Absa runs a three-year articles programme, accredited by SAICA and Chartered Institute of Management Accountants, targeting university-level students. The bank recruits eight to 10 top graduates from leading universities every year. Trainees rotate on an eight-month cycle across various business divisions within the bank, while first-year trainees form part of the group-wide GenA Grad programme, through which they are exposed to diverse training summits, including presenting banking solutions to colleagues in

Highest paying STEM degrees in South Africa (Figures for 2018)

After analysing over 140,000 online job posts, Adzuna has revealed degrees in STEM) are bound to bring in the most cash after graduation.

Engineering graduates now earn more than any other STEM grads

Adzuna’s research, which was conducted in August 2018, compared the average salaries of jobs requiring applicants to have specific STEM degrees. Coming in at the top of the results, chemical engineers earned average salaries of R603,999 if they held bachelors or master’s degrees in the subject. Graduates with civil engineering and computer science degrees came in at second and third place, earning average salaries of R577,579 and R546,259 respectively.

Graduates with degrees in mathematics and life sciences are offered average take-home pays of R389,887 and R313,400, with degrees in life science valued below the SA average salary of R356,735 per year.

Note: These figures are for 2018 and analysts say salaries have risen since with increasing career openings.

Information Technology graduates have the most job opportunities

Although graduates with aeronautical engineering and chemical engineering degrees have high earning potential, they are definitely not the most in demand. Due to their nature, only 256 job ads across SA mention either of these subjects as a requirement to apply for the role.

Graduates looking to land high-paying jobs offering a variety of career opportunities, a degree in computer science is probably the best bet. As AI rises in business and society, the demand for employees with tech skills and knowledge continues to sky rocket. Job seekers with an Information Technology (IT) degree were the most in demand with a whopping 13,743 job vacancies, followed by computer science, with 4,303 vacancies on offer.

 Note: These figures are for 2018 and analysts say salaries have risen since with increasing career openings.

Math and Science still in a league of their own

Degrees in statistics made the top five for both salary and potential number of jobs available, which makes it a good all round choice. If you’re an undergrad and still uncertain about your future in STEM, a mathematics degree is also a great option, as it provides a gateway to a variety of industries like finance, engineering and data science.