Eighty-three per cent of students at University College Isle of Man (UCM) got a first class or upper second class grade degree.

Those grades are the highest possible.

UCM has exceeded the UK average for the last three years.

Jo Pretty, the principal of the college, said: ’When you combine enthusiastic and hardworking students, experienced and committed lecturers and a business community that contributes and supports the students learning experience - these are the sort of grades that can be achieved.

’We also find that our students are immediately able to secure relevant employment, not only because of the quality of their degrees but because they have been able to engage and network with future employers throughout their studies.’

The college says it is expanding courses that intergrate undergraduate study with work-based learning.

The degrees offered at the college are conferred by the University of Chester and it says they have a ’strong focus on the needs of the island’s economy’.

Those areas include information technology. business, accounting and finance, event management and marketing, the creative industries, public health, manufacturing engineering sport and history and heritage.

New for 2017/18 are a BSc Hons cybersecurity and an MSc advanced computer science.

Gail Corrin, higher education manager said: ’There are now almost 300 full and part-time degree and postgraduate students at UCM. Numbers are increasing each year and in addition to school leavers, we have noticed more and more people wanting to study later in life as they develop or change their careers.’

The results will be recognised at an event at the Villa Marina on October 13.