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Graduates from top-ranked universities less likely to lie on CVs

Danielle McQueen, 24 July 2008
 If you graduated from one of the nation’s top 20 universities, you are less likely to lie on your CV to get a good job according to a survey by pre-employment screening firm Powerchex. But if you graduated from one of the UK’s lowest ranked schools, you are more likely to embellish your background.


The survey found 43 percent of applicants from the UK’s lowest ranking universities have some form of major embellishment hidden in their application, compared to just 14 percent of applicants from the Top 20 rated schools.  “What this survey says is that graduates from lesser-known universities may feel they need to alter their background to compete”, said Powerchex managing director Alexandra Kelly. “There appears to be a trend that the lower ranked the university, the higher the likelihood of discrepancies on a CV.”. Kai Peters, Chief Executive at Ashridge Business School agrees with Kelly. He added: "The survey suggests that individuals with the discipline to get into good universities are proud of their performance and see no need to embellish their CVs"


The survey also revealed a link between the subject area studied at university and the frequency of falsifications. More specifically, graduates in the subjects of arts and humanities had the highest rate of discrepancies (22 percent) while maths based students tend to have the lowest (6 percent). Contrary to popular opinion, graduates in finance also had a low rate of falsifications (13 percent), second only to maths when it comes to being honest on job applications.
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