End-of-fellowship surveys reveal career paths of MSCA alumni
Most MSCA fellows stay in Europe to pursue a career in research and innovation after their fellowship.
All researchers participating in Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) projects must complete an evaluation questionnaire, immediately after the fellowship, and a follow-up questionnaire 2 years later.
The European Commission regularly publishes the latest results of these 2 questionnaires. The 2025 report focuses more specifically on career paths of former fellows after their participation in MSCA projects.
The results are based on responses of fellows who participated in projects funded under Horizon 2020 (2014-2020), as there are still few fellowships completed under Horizon Europe.
Skills development and relevance for fellows’ careers
Overall, fellows report a high satisfaction with the quality of MSCA training. 86% of respondents consider the training provided as good or very good.
The skills acquired during the fellowship are highly relevant for fellows in their career afterwards.
Around one third of MSCA fellows gain experience outside academia during their fellowship.
2 years later, 95% of fellows who spent at least part of their fellowship outside academia considered that the experience had made a positive contribution to their career afterwards.
54% of respondents felt that their experience outside of academia had significantly or greatly benefited their career since completing the fellowship.
2 years later, more than 98% of fellows had used the skills acquired during the MSCA fellowship in their work.
Careers after MSCA
The questionnaires provide figures on employment status of former Innovative Training Networks (ITN i.e. doctoral programmes), COFUND (ie co-funded programmes) and MSCA Individual Fellowship (IF) researchers at the end of their fellowship and 2 years afterwards.
Around 57% of former fellows had already found employment at the end of their fellowships. 26% were still in training (e.g. still completing their PhD), 14% unemployed and 9% inactive for other reasons (i.e. career break, parental leave, etc.).
2 years later, the share of former ITN, COFUND and IF fellows in employment is significantly higher with 87% of respondents either employed or self-employed, 5% in education/training and 7% unemployed at the time of completing the follow-up questionnaire.
Among those employed, 44% had a permanent or indefinite contract, 13% a temporary contract of more than 3 years, 28% a contract lasting between 1 and 3 years, and 15% a short contract of up to 1 year.
Experienced researchers tended to have a lower unemployment rate compared to former MSCA doctoral candidates (2% vs 9%).
Most employed former fellows (90%) continue to work in research-related fields after their MSCA project.
Geographical location and sectors
Most MSCA fellows stay in Europe after the fellowship. 2 years later, 69% of former ITN, COFUND and IF fellows were still working or living within the EU-27, 11% in the United Kingdom, 7% in Horizon 2020 Associated Countries and 13% in non-associated third countries.
Among those employed, 72% of ITN, COFUND and IF former fellows work within academia immediately after the fellowship, with a similar figure two years later.
Among those working outside academia, the main employers immediately after the fellowship were large enterprises (43%) and SMEs (26%), followed by private nonprofit (10%), public administration (8%) and other sectors (e.g. international organisations, hospitals, museums, etc.) (13%). Academia is the sector with the lowest share of former MSCA fellows on permanent or indefinite contracts.
Among those employed in academia two years after their fellowship, 33% had a permanent or indefinite contract, 17% had a temporary contract of more than 3 years, 33% a contract lasting between 1 and 3 years, and 17% a contract of up to 1 year. The share under permanent or indefinite contract was higher among experienced researchers (43%) than among former doctoral researchers (13%).
By contrast, large enterprises and SMEs have the largest share of former fellows employed under a permanent or indefinite contract, with 82% and 80% respectively.
In 2025, the MSCA will open a Choose Europe for Science pilot call which will aim to address the issue of job precarity and promote more attractive and sustainable research careers in Europe.
About the end-of-fellowship questionnaires
Since 2018, a total of over 25,000 MSCA fellows have completed the evaluation questionnaire and over 5,000 have completed the follow-up questionnaire.
Introduced under Horizon 2020, the EU’s research and innovation framework programme for 2014-2020, these questionnaires have complemented other existing tools, such as the Marie Curie Alumni Association’s Major Survey.
The questionnaires collect feedback from former MSCA fellows on the impact of the fellowship on their research, skills development and career since the completion of their MSCA project. They are also one of the programme’s main career tracking tools, collecting information on the career paths and mobility of former fellows’ since their MSCA fellowship.
A large number of MSCA projects funded under Horizon 2020 have recently finished and few are still ongoing. As a result, the programme is still collecting responses to the end-of-fellowships surveys.
The results of the surveys will be analysed regularly and will inform about the future development of the programme. Once a large enough sample is available for Horizon Europe, similar analysis will be conducted on responses from researchers funded under the current framework programme.
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