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Things Are Tough All Over, Part 1,998,753

Two articles of note this morning from NY Times and the Houston Press: In response to tough job market, law schools are inflating grades.  Law students are seeing their grades rise by as much as one grade point as schools adjust their grading systems to make graduates more attractive to hiring managers.  This seems like an awfully crass method of responding to the Great Recession. The odds of this making any difference in potential hires is low and the cost to law school reputations are high.  So why would schools such as UT-Austin and Georgetown play such a devious game? In the Houston Press, Rice University's Shannon Franklin, assistant director of the Jones Graduate School of Business, talks about the... Read More »

Latest Stats on Class of 2010 Show Slight Improvement in Job Market

According to the National Association of Colleges and Employers, only 24.4% of the class of 2010's college grads had jobs upon graduation. Those are not exactly stellar numbers nor a great return on a college education.  However, this is an uptick over last year's job numbers, when only 19.7% of the class of 2009 had jobs upon graduation from college.  Missing from these job statistics are any indication of the quality of the jobs being offered to recent college graduates. I have no data to back this up, but my intuition is that actual hiring for "career oriented jobs" (i.e. those not in retail or restaurant sectors) is flat, with total job numbers up only because more grads are... Read More »

Moving In With Mom and Dad After Graduation

Yesterday's Baltimore Sun reported on the epidemic of college grads moving back in with mom and dad after graduation.  A survey of the Class of 2010 college graduates reported that 7 out of 10 will move in with parents after graduation. But more significant than the short-term inconvenience of living at home again is the real struggle to find a job and start an adult life. Read More »

Starting Salaries for Selected College Majors

I take all of the data I see with a huge grain of salt, especially when it comes to average salaries, because gathering  accurate salary data is nearly impossible without access to tax returns.  However, even if the below salary numbers are not accurate, they are likely representative of an overall pattern.  For some number of years, engineers, particularly in the chemical and petroleum sectors have been receiving higher starting salaries than their classmates.  Computer Science majors have also been both highly sought after and well-paid.  As for grads with Business or Marketing degrees, their starting salary may appear to be respectable, but the demand for their services has not been high... Read More »

Soon to be High School Seniors, Here’s Your Blueprint for Admission Success and a Stress-Free Summer

Summer before Senior year is a crucial period in the college admissions process.  Spending your time wisely is very important.  The choices you make this summer will determine if your fall semester is a breeze or a disaster. If you have completed all of these steps, then you can relax and enjoy a peaceful summer:

• Created a research list of 20 prospective colleges that fulfill my academic, social, and vocational needs
• Reduced the list to the 10 colleges I will apply to
• Have accurately categorized the 10 schools into Stretches, Targets and Safeties
• Visited 2 of my safeties and know I can be happy attending either if I receive no other acceptances
• Had tours at some target and reach schools
• Had impactful interviews at my top... Read More »

  Tags: admissions, application, class of 2011, High School, junior, summer

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