Which four-year degree programs at each University of Hawaiʻi campus retain the greatest shares of graduates in Hawaiʻi five and ten years after graduation?
Workforce Understory Episode: Episode Two — Understanding Underemployment
Geography: Statewide
Topic: Graduate retention, job quality, campus outcomes, and connection to place
The takeaway
Across UH campuses, the four-year programs with the highest graduate-retention rates are consistently concentrated in fields such as Education, Public Administration, Psychology, Social Sciences, and Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender, and Group Studies.
At UH Mānoa, Public Administration leads at five years with 86% retention, followed closely by Education at 84%. By year ten, Education rises to 87%.
At UH West Oʻahu, Education and Psychology each show 100% retention at year five, while Social Sciences leads at year ten with 82%. At UH Hilo, Psychology has the highest five-year rate at 82%, and Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender, and Group Studies leads at year ten with 73%.
UH Maui College is a pronounced outlier. Its sole four-year program shown, Business, retains 20% of graduates at year five and only 12% at year ten.
The degree programs most likely to retain graduates are often rooted in education, public service, human services, and community—but they are rarely the programs with the strongest wage outcomes.
What this visualization shows
This visualization identifies the four-year degree programs at each UH campus with the highest shares of graduates remaining in Hawaiʻi five and ten years after graduation.
Although the campuses offer different programs and serve different student populations, a consistent pattern emerges. Education, Public Administration, Psychology, Social Sciences, and culturally grounded interdisciplinary fields repeatedly appear near the top of the retention rankings.
At UH Mānoa, Education and Public Administration maintain particularly strong retention over time. At UH West Oʻahu, Education and Psychology show complete retention at five years in the data presented, although those rates should be interpreted carefully because smaller program cohorts can produce unusually high or volatile percentages.
UH Hilo also shows strong staying power in Psychology and Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender, and Group Studies. The latter category includes Hawaiian Studies and other fields whose content may be especially connected to Hawaiʻi’s communities, cultures, and institutions.
UH Maui College follows a very different pattern. Business is the only four-year program represented, and its retention rate is substantially lower than the leading programs at every other campus.
The visualization does not explain why graduates remain or leave. It does show that the programs retaining the greatest shares of graduates often differ from those generating the highest wages.
Why this matters
Keeping locally educated graduates in Hawaiʻi is an important workforce goal, but retention by itself does not reveal whether graduates are building economically sustainable careers.
The programs with the greatest staying power often prepare people for work in schools, government, behavioral health, human services, nonprofit organizations, and community institutions. These careers may be deeply connected to local relationships, professional licenses, cultural knowledge, and a commitment to serving Hawaiʻi.
Those connections can be a powerful source of retention.
Yet many of the same fields have comparatively modest wage outcomes. Graduates may remain because they value their work and community, but they may also face limited financial mobility, high housing costs, and fewer resources for building long-term security.
It is also possible that graduates in some lower-paying fields have fewer economic incentives or opportunities to relocate. Determining whether high retention reflects rootedness, constrained mobility, or both requires more evidence.
UH Maui College raises a different set of questions. Its single reported four-year program retains only a small share of graduates over time. That could reflect limited local demand for Business graduates, migration to Oʻahu or the continental United States, small cohort sizes, or the particular structure of Maui’s labor market.
These campus differences suggest that retention must be considered alongside wages, career advancement, regional employer demand, and the quality of the jobs graduates enter.
This evidence invites Hawaiʻi to ask:
Are graduates remaining because Hawaiʻi offers sustainable careers—or because their commitment to place is stronger than the economic opportunities available to them?
Evidence:
Questions this visualization helps answer
Which programs have the highest five-year retention rates at UH Mānoa, UH West Oʻahu, and UH Hilo?
Which programs sustain high retention through year ten?
Which fields appear repeatedly among the highest-retention programs across campuses?
Do the strongest-retention programs also produce living-wage earnings?
How do retention patterns differ among UH campuses?
Which campus appears least successful at retaining graduates from its reported four-year programs?
Curiosity:
Questions this visualization raises
Why do Education, Public Administration, Psychology, and Social Sciences repeatedly rank among the highest-retention fields?
Does high retention reflect strong attachment to community, family, culture, and public service?
Are graduates remaining despite weak wages because relocating is financially difficult?
Would graduates in these fields earn substantially more in other states?
How should the 100% five-year retention rates at UH West Oʻahu be interpreted given the possible effect of small cohorts?
Are Education and Psychology graduates still working in occupations related to their degrees?
What explains Education’s strong and stable retention at UH Mānoa?
Does Area, Ethnic, Cultural, Gender, and Group Studies strengthen graduates’ connection to Hawaiʻi and their likelihood of remaining?
What jobs do graduates from those programs enter?
Which high-retention programs also provide living-wage earnings and opportunities for advancement?
How do job quality, workload, burnout, benefits, and professional support affect long-term retention?
Why does UH Maui College’s Business program retain only 20% of graduates at five years and 12% at ten years?
Are UH Maui College graduates relocating elsewhere in Hawaiʻi or leaving the state entirely?
Does Maui have sufficient employer demand and advancement opportunities for four-year Business graduates?
Could small graduating cohorts be contributing to the unusually low or high rates shown?
How do retention outcomes vary by island of origin, race, gender, income, age, and first-generation status?
How many graduates leave and later return?
What policies could improve wages and job quality in fields that already retain graduates?
What regional economic-development strategies could create stronger destinations for graduates from campuses with low retention?
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