Good news! 2007 college graduates are earning higher salaries than last year’s grads, according to a new report from the National Association of Colleges and Employers. Starting pay offers rose for bachelor’s-degree graduates in 26 out of 29 majors, the study shows. Among business majors, marketing graduates enjoyed the largest increase — 10.3% — for an average salary offer of $41,285.

60% of employers surveyed by NACE report plans to hire more college graduates this year than last. They expect to increase recruiting for this group by about 20%, the survey shows.

Job / Salary

Accounting – $47,975
Consulting - $51,120
Management Trainee (Entry-Level Mgmt.) – $41,894
Sales – $39,316
Public Accounting – $46,289
Financial / Treasury Analysis – $50,476
Project Engineering – $52,258
Design / Construction Engineering – $48,731
Teaching – $32,488
Software Design & Development- $54,624

We saw this story on feministing.com. Their attempt at “satire” was bungled to say the least. It’s good to know that the women’s Center at UCSD is holding a letter writing get-together about this.

For shame! Even Ivy educated women are earning less than men. Is it due to career choices? Nursing? Teaching? Counseling? How wide is the gap when they’re looking at the same profession?

Here are some shocking statistics:

A report released on April 23, 2007 by the American Association of University Women found that “women one year out of a 4-year college earn 80% of what their male counterparts earn.”

10 Years After Graduation – Women earn 69 cents to every dollar that men earn 10 years after graduation; the wage gap widens to 12%.

Educated Women Experience a Greater Pay Gap – Catherine Hill, research director at AAUW tesified that attending a highly-selective institution does little to boost a woman’s pay, and educated women experience a greater pay gap than women overall.

Source:
Pay Gap Exists as Early as One Year out of College, Says New Research Report

women | jobs, work, careers

Increase your earning potential. Studies show that advanced degrees improve your base salary by upwards of 50%! Look into getting your degree online so that you can schedule your classes around your work and home life. Consider an online MBA program or an online psychology degree. Here are some salary stats:
MBA salary
Psychologist salary

Psychology professor Barry Schwartz from Swarthmore has a very interesting solution to the Ivy Game insanity that I’ve been so cranky about lately. Read his op-ed in the LA Times. He has some sound psychology-based arguments for making the college admissions process a “crapshoot”.

“There is a simple way to dramatically reduce the pressure and competition that our most talented students now experience. When selective institutions get the students’ applications, the schools can scrutinize them using the same high standards they currently use and decide which of the applicants is good enough to be admitted. Then the names of all the “good enough” students could be placed in a metaphorical hat, with the “winners” drawn at random for admission. Though a high school student will still have to work hard to be “good enough” for Yale, she won’t have to distort her life in the way she would if she had to be the “best.” The only reason left for participating in all those enrichment programs would be interest, not competitive advantage.”

The cynic in me (I know I must read like a Pollyanna, but I’m totally not) assumes the helicopter parents will find some way to warp that system, too, and their kids will still end up freaked out and incapable of rational thought. But it’s still something to think about.

I, however, am at a loss. After I thought myself into a corner with the grey blobs of plasma, I ran out of ideas for making this college admissions gauntlet less psychotic. I have very young children, so I have time to hone my College Admissions Gauntlet Philosophy before I actually have to give my kiddos advice about their college careers. Besides telling my kids that they have free will (sometimes I like to implement off-the-wall ideas) and can go to college or not, it’s up to them, I think I might also forbid them from applying to any Ivies. That won’t work either; then they’ll go to Harvard just to piss me off.

Posted by Alexa Harrington

Please make it stop.

The high-pressure college admission insanity is verging on ridiculous. The parents are rabid. The kids are somewhere between highly-trained seals who can perform on command but may not be able to think for themselves, and freaked out lumps of carbon, hoping the extreme parental pressure will turn them into diamonds. Private college counselors are being hired, theoretically, to help guide high school students through the college application process. I imagine most parents feel it’s necessary simply because it’s available and if they don’t hire a private counselor, they won’t have done absolutely everything in their power to get Little Sally into the very best college. They can’t stop now—they’ve been working at getting Sally into an Ivy since before she was in the womb. She had the best Petri dish, the best play group, the best preschool, the best primary and secondary schools. If they don’t do everything to get her into the best college or university (and by best I mean schools with names that are familiar even to starving children in third world countries who have more critical things to think about) she could end up in some private, unheard-of liberal arts college or, god forbid, some state school in the middle of America where they eat potatoes and watch football. Because everyone knows you can only be adequately educated at an elite school—the other three thousand schools are just there to fill in some voids we had on the landscape.

What size font do I have to use to get people to understand that where a student matriculates from the ages of 18 to 22 doesn’t matter enough for it to be the life or death situation some parents are making it out to be? I’m barely keeping the foul language reigned in. School is good. Knowledge and the whole concept of learning how to learn (which is the main reason for going to college) are excellent reasons to aim for higher education. If a person feels that college is where they want to be, then by all means, jump on in. Yea school. The problem I’m having (besides holding back the foul language) is understanding how and why parents these days are so totally involved in their kids’ college admissions process. The parents are frantic and the kids are basket cases. Is everyone really so worried that Sally won’t get into at least one school? Is there that large a discrepancy between the number of college-bound seniors and the number of freshmen spots in the 3,000-plus colleges and universities across the U.S.?

I’ve looked and looked, and there is nary an article or a statistic that mentions too many college-bound high school seniors for the number of freshmen slots at colleges and universities in the U.S. I would imagine that if there was, in fact, a shortage of spots for incoming freshmen, panic would ensue and it would be all over the news. I did come across several articles about helicopter parenting and hyper parents and kids being too stressed out to take a lunch break or a yoga class. Basically, only a very tiny (but oddly loud and incredibly jumpy) portion of the U.S. population is involved in this insane Ivy Game. I want to not care at all, but I have vicarious nausea and stress for the unfortunately fortunate offspring of the helicopter parents. Run, kids. Run far, far away. But first, by all means feel free to jump through their hoops and get into the elite school your parents were aiming you toward. Let them pay for your exorbitantly overpriced education (since they really seem to want to). And then, when you’ve been educated within an inch of your life, maybe they’ll land the damn helicopter and you can have your life back.

More Disturbing Articles to Read:

The Wrong Conversation

Anxiety Rising on U.S. College Campuses

Education Statistics

Posted by Alexa Harrington

Across the Country Colleges are Becoming More Selective

On April 3rd, 2007, The Wall Street Journal reported that this year Ivy League, top-tier state schools and smaller liberal arts colleges received more applications trom well-qualified students and consequently turned down a higher percentage of them. Even schools that admit the vast majority of applicants are becoming more selective.

University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill received 20,017 applications, up from 19,736 last year. The state school’s acceptance rate fell to 33.3% from 34.1%.

Kenyon College
At Kenyon College in Gambier, Ohio, 4,624 students applied, up 8%, yet it accepted 1,348, down from 1,395 last year, to prevent overenrollment.

Miami University
Miami University in Oxford, Ohio, saw a record 15,836 applicants this year, up from 15,498 the year before; it accepted 73% of them, down from 78% last year.

Georgetown University
Georgetown University saw applications rise to 16,198 from 15,067 last year. It accepted 20% of them, down from 22% a year ago.

The University of Pennsylvania
The University of Pennsylvania saw applications rise 11% over the last year to a record 22,634, while its acceptance rate fell to 15% from about 17% last year.

Dartmouth College
Dartmouth College had a record 14,176 applications, up 2% from last year. It accepted 2,165, or 15% — its lowest acceptance rate in history.

Yale University
Yale University’s applications fell to 19,323 from 21,101 last year. Although there has been speculation that Yale’s low acceptance rate last year caused fewer students to apply this year.

Harvard University
Harvard University drew a record 22,955 applicants and accepted a record low 9%.

Stanford University
At Stanford University, the number of applications rose 7% to 23,956. It accepted 10.3%, down from 10.9% last year.

What is Fueling the Rise in Applications?

1. More Students Graduating From High School
The number of students graduating from high school has risen each year since the 1995-96 school year, according to the National Association for College Admission Counseling. The U.S. Department of Education predicts that the trend will continue until at least 2013.

2. International Students
More colleges are recruiting international students. UNC-Chapel Hill had 736 foreign nationals apply this year, up from 590 last year. The university admitted 167 of them, up from about 125 a year ago.

3. The Common Application
More students than ever are using theCommon Application, a form that can be completed online and sent to a number of admissions offices far more easily than paper-based applications. More than 300 schools accept it. Most students apply to more than 15 schools using the common application.

4. Applicants With More Realistic Expectations
High school guidance counselors are encouraging students to apply to safety schools.

College | University