The University of Hull has been named fourth best University in Yorkshire by the Times and Sunday Times Good University Guide. It has also moved two places up the league tables, from 67th last year, to joint 65th this year. The latest rankings come a week after Times Higher World University Rankings revealed the University in the top three per cent in the world, for the second year running. This year, the University was also named joint eighth nationally for employability and commended by QAA education watchdog for the quality of our student provision.

But what does this actually mean for alumni?

The real value of your degree is incalculable in so many ways because it is inextricably linked with your student experience; the links that you established, the formative experiences in the bar, on the sports field, the stage, the lecture theatre or in digs – these things can never really be quantified in any meaningful way.

Despite this, and regardless of when you attended Hull – your Hull degree, diploma or formal qualification has a market value and, to put it crudely, like all assets this value is in a constant state of flux; the good news is that your Hull stock is rising fast!

The University of Hull is the guardian of this value – its strategic direction, the shape and structure of its faculties, the quality of its research and teaching all have a direct bearing on the immediate and long term value of your degree and this can be crucial when you seek to trade your qualifications in the employment market.

Corporations and consultancies do fight over the alumni of higher education institutions. Institutions realise this: London’s Cass Business School writes to all alumni to update them when the league table position shifts and ‘when it took a very slight tumble in one of them two years ago, Cass assured its graduates the matter was being addressed’ (Guardian, January 2013).

Naturally, it’s never a simple transaction; a whole range of interpersonal and sometimes coincidental factors come into play when hiring decisions are made. The University can help prepare you for the jobs market through the provision of quality higher education, lifelong careers advice and access to job opportunities but, ultimately, a range of unknowns will also contribute to the outcome.

A genuinely positive step that you can take to ensure that the value of your degree is well understood by employers is to share the good news on social media and by word of mouth. League table success boosts levels of loyalty and pride amongst graduates – take these emotions and project them as far as possible.