Investigating the relationship between university brand and career orientation of students

Due to the emergence of challenges of traditional employment patterns, including the global demand for professional work, the higher education sector is facing increasing demand for more efficient transfer of graduates from training to work. Accordingly, this study was conducted with the aim of evaluating the relationship between the university brand and the constructive career orientation of students of Gorgan University of Agricultural Sciences and Natural Resources. The method of this research is descriptive-correlational survey. A total of 120 final year students were selected as a sample using Krejcie and Morgan table and random sampling method. The research data collection tool was a researcher-made questionnaire. The validity of the questionnaire was determined with the opinion of expert professors. The reliability of the questionnaire was confirmed by Cronbach's alpha test of 0.96. Findings showed that most of the respondents, ie 66.1% described the university brand as a medium and weak brand and 48.6% were in a good position in terms of constructive job orientation. Also, there is a significant relationship between students' constructive career orientation and their perception of the university brand at the level of 0.01, so the credibility of the university and students' mental image of its brand can have an important effect on students' constructive career orientation.