Employment Transition and Competencies of Qur'anic Studies and Exegesis Graduates: Evidence from Alumni and Employer Surveys

Abstract

Graduate tracer studies help programmes judge how the competencies they build relate to graduates' experiences at work, yet studies of Qur'anic Studies and Exegesis (IAT) programmes rarely read alumni and employer evidence side by side. This study examines the employment transition of the 2022–2025 IAT graduates of STAIN Sultan Abdurrahman, Riau Islands, together with employers' assessments of graduate performance and competency needs. A descriptive survey design combined frequencies, percentages, and means with a thematic grouping of open-ended responses from 33 alumni and six employing institutions. Twenty-six alumni (78.8%) were employed and four (12.1%) self-employed; 22 (66.7%) obtained their first job within three months, although 21 (63.6%) had already worked before graduation. Twenty-one (63.6%) rated the match between job and field highly and 25 (75.8%) rated the contribution of IAT knowledge highly, while exegesis was most often named for strengthening. Employers rated integrity, communication, and use of technology at 4.83 out of 5 and four Islamic-academic indicators at 4.17. Five of the six employers were very satisfied, yet five asked for stronger foreign language skills. Read together, the surveys show that favourable judgements of general workplace competencies coexist with a need for deeper exegetical training, language skills, professional practice, and career support, offering a basis for reviewing the programme's learning outcomes.