Happy 2013!

It seems that at the beginning of each new year there is a plethora of lists naming the top 10 this or the worst ten of that from the previous calendar year.  There are a few categories and "winners" that might interest you.  Before we get into the lists - a word of caution.  Remember the recent dust up when it was discovered that George Washington University had "misrepresented" the data as to what percentage of freshmen in fall 2011 were in the top 10% of their high school graduating classes. (The Washington Post, November 9, 2012, "Data Errors Could Mean 'Slight Change' in GWU Ranking", by Nick Anderson)  As with any ranking it's important to know if the date on which the rank is based is accurate.  Basura in - basura out.  For you non-Spanish speakers - Garbage in (in GWU's case, inaccuracies) -garbage out.

On November 15, 2012, Colleen Kane posted "America's Deadliest Jobs 2012" on CNBC.com.  The statistics were obtained from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics and used to rank jobs with the highest fatal work injury rates.  The number one "honor" fell to workers in the agriculture, forestry, fishing and hunting industries with a rate of 24.4 fatalities per 100,000 full time workers.  By comparison, the industry with the lowest fatality rate is education and health services with .8 per 100,000 workers.

On November 29, 2012, Townhall.com ran a post "2012's Worst Paying College Degrees".  They used the 2012-2013 College Salary Report from a great site - Payscale.com.  Payscale used data from its online salary database to produce a list of college degrees that go along with the "lowest median pay".  Child and Family Studies is lowest at $37,700.  Their analyst, Katie Bardaro, stated, "According to our research, people in these majors typically believe their work makes the world a better place."  Townhall is blunt in response:
    To translate, the people in these majors are perhaps so disconnected from
    reality that they do not recognize that the reason their trades provide
    so little return on their educational investment is because they really
    do not require unique ability, which is why society does not
    reward them with greater compensation.
The authors assert that higher education then "exploits" these individuals by having them pay nearly the same amount of money as students pay for degrees leading to careers that society values a lot more. This is a brilliant observation.  It would seem to take a lot more money to build labs for biomedical students than to man a program for most social work majors, yet the tuition is basically the same, perhaps with the addition of a nominal "lab fee" for the biomed students.

Paul Toscano and Colleen Kane also use data from Payscale for  their CNBC.com post of September 27, 2012, "Colleges That Bring In the Highest Paycheck 2012".  They posted the top 10 highest earning schools whose grads make an average salary of $122,500 at mid-career.  In contrast, the bottom 10 schools' graduates earn an average of $44,490 by mid-career.  A point of interest to the "earnest" student - "...the top party school by salary potential is University of Illinois at Urbana - Champaign (UIUC) with a mid-career salary of $95,900."

The Business Insider published a post by Abby Rigers and Gus Lubin on November 20, 2012 entitled, "The Most Dangerous Colleges in America".  They used data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation's Uniform Crime Report. The ranking was based on a "combination of violent crime rank and property crime rank, with violent crime weighted four times higher".  The post can be found at www.businessinsider.com.

The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE) has praised seven colleges as "best for free speech in 2012".  They are:  James Madison University;  The College of William and Mary; University of Mississippi; Mississippi State University; University of Tennessee - Knoxville; University of Virginia and the University of Pennsylvania.  FIRE's president, Greg Lukianoff, has written a book, Unlearning Liberty:  Campus Censorship and the End of American Debate.

Running the Real Numbers

In the Wall Street Journal  "Weekend Investor" of July 28-29, 2012, there was an article entitled, "You Paid for College How?" by Anna Maria Andriotis.  The author states that while, according to the U.S. Census, average household income fell 6% between 2006 and 2010, the annual cost at 4 year private non-profit colleges increased 14% from five years earlier.  In-state four year public college costs rose 20% in that same period!  The college cost statistics are from the College Board and all percentages were adjusted for inflation.  The figures are daunting and the article discusses ways in which families may cover college costs and the pros and cons of each strategy.  Some strategies include:  Tuition Installment Plans; Home Equity Loans; Credit Cards; Life Insurance and Loans.  The article is definitely worth a read.

What makes the task of covering college costs even more difficult is trying to find out what that cost will actually be.  Since 2011 colleges were mandated by Congress to provide a Net Price Calculator (NPC) on their online sites.  However, according to Rachel Louise Ensign in the Wall Street Journal of April 28-29, 2012, some colleges "lowball costs" by asking few questions.  "Others are splashy but potentially confusing."  In some cases, projected costs are an average of 14% less than what the student will actually wind up paying.  That's according to a study by FinAid.org which also provides an online calculator.

Some of the things to look for when judging the accuracy of a college's NPC are:
1)  Who developed the college's calculator?  those developed by the college or outside company tend to be more accurate than those using the standard template provided by the U.S. Department of Education.
2)  Does it ask more than 10 questions?
3)  Does it include questions that may help determine aid based on merit such as academic performance?
A helpful site to visit for more links and information as to how to understand and use NPC's is http://netpricecalculator.info.  NPC's that aren't  accurate and useful are mere gadgetry!

This blog will resume with a new post on January 9, 2013. 
 Blessed Thanksgiving and a very happy holiday season to all!

Job Outlook

This past spring, there seemed to have been a lot more articles about overwhelming student debt rather than the outlook for 2012 college grads.  The job outlook for them was a bit better but it's still tough and even tougher for 2010 and 2011 graduates.  It seems most people would rather have a new model than one that's been sitting on the used car lot for a year or more.

Recently a financial analyst appearing on a Fox Business Network show said that engineering is the only discipline with full employment even in this bad economy.  The U.S. has 300 colleges/universities that have engineering programs.  India, on the other hand has 3400. So India, with roughly four times the population of the United States, has over TEN times the number of engineering programs.  That's not to say that everyone should or could become an engineer but, with it being possible rather than probable that grads will land a job quickly, it's even more important that you consider the cost of your education and how you will cover it.

According to the Wall Street Journal of April 28-29, 2012, college graduates' earnings have fallen in the past decade about 15% and the average college debt has risen by 24%.  Many articles have been written in recent months as to how students can navigate and mitigate this debt.  Karen Blumenthal has written two interesting articles on this topic for the Journal - "The Student Debt Handbook",  April 21-22, 2012 and "Help for Student Borrowers",  August 11-12, 2012.  Both are worth a read.

One sure-fire way to avoid the pitfall of overwhelming debt is to know not only how much you must spend to afford a specific college but to know how much you can spend.  In the next post of 11/14 I'll discuss college cost calculators.

Wishing Will NOT Make It So!

Each time I began a career exploration segment with my students, I would start with a disclaimer to the worn out cliche, "You can be whatever you want to be".  One of the most important aspects of what you need to do when deciding what you "want to be" is an assessment of your talents and determination.  I would use the example with my kids that I may have wanted to be an Olympic figure skater or a concert pianist.  However, having never taken  a lesson and having had no desire to awaken at 4:00 a.m. for a morning practice at the rink nor to practice for hours on end to master "Frere Jacques",  that ship had sailed.  I like the old Army ad slogan, "Be all that you can be".  That phrase recognizes that you need to assess your potential and work to realize it.

One of the main goals in writing this blog is to help students find ways to assess their individual interests and abilities and explore career options that might suit them.  If you followed my posts and researched topics in the archives, you have an arsenal of tools with which to work.  Since I have already outlined a pretty complete approach to the process, I will spend future posts to delve deeper into subjects and highlight current approaches, books, tools and topics that might be of assistance.  In the past I published a post every other Wednesday.  In an effort not to be redundant, I will now post every third Wednesday.  The next post will appear on Wednesday, October 24.

Welcome Back!

The new school year has begun and with that comes the knowledge, for most of us, that the summer was not spent as productively as we had planned during those late May days.  College exploration and  application essays were hardly thought of at all as we gazed at those high summer skies.  Well, it's back to reality!!!  Unfortunately,  some medical procedures prohibit my being able to work at the computer for any great length of time.  Therefore, I too will be guilty of procrastination, as I am scheduling my first post for the school year for Wednesday, October 3.  It is entitled, 'Wishing Does NOT Make It So!",  and  it's worth a read.  Until then, I suggest you go back into the archives and review still timely suggestions in posts such as the "Welcome Back" post of 9-21-11.

How to Spend Your Summer Vacation

I am proud to announce that I have topped the 1000 page view mark!  I began this blog in August 2009 with the intention of helping students and parents with the daunting task of career planning and training.  As is my habit, I take the summer off.  (After over five decades of being on one side of the desk or the other, I believe I deserve this respite.)   I hope you enjoy your vacation and put the extra time to good use.   Please go back in the archives to the post of June 8, 2011 for suggestions as to how to spend part of your vacation.  Hope to see you in September!  (NOTE: collegeboard.com is now collegeboard.org)

Post Graduate Prospects

With the month of May come college commencements and news articles about the job outlook for graduates who hope to commence their careers.  In many of my previous posts I've discussed whether the advantages of having a degree justify the cost. The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics said that last year's unemployment rate was 4.9% for college graduates while it was 9.4% for those with no college. Also, those with a bachelor's degree had a median salary of just over $1,000 a week while high school graduates with no college earned a little over $600 a week.  That's a big difference and if you spent $10,000 a year just on tuition at a relatively inexpensive public college, it would only take about two years on the job to make up the difference -
assuming you have a job!!!


Jack Hough, a columnist at SmartMoney.com, recently wrote about PayScale, a Seattle based data firm which examines the links between pay and variables like colleges and majors.  PayScale's Katie Bardaro says students should consider the salary they are likely to make before deciding how much to spend on college.  Mr. Hough notes that according to Labor Department data, wages for college graduates rose just 9% while in the past 20 years college costs have risen 184%.


Don't just decide how much you CAN afford to spend on college but how much you SHOULD spend in order to capitalize on your investment.  Sara Murray and Joe Light wrote an article  on the job outlook for college graduates for the Wall Street Journal weekend edition of May 21-22, 2011.  (I'm sure one citing this year's prospects will be published soon.)  Some of their findings are still very relevant and, unfortunately, pertinent:


     Even for those lucky enough to land jobs, the consequences
     of graduating in a weak economy are severe.  Those who
     enter the work force during downturns tend to go for decades 
     earning lower wages than their counterparts who started their 
     careers when the economy was healthy.
     Meanwhile, some degrees are far more valuable than others.
     Computer science, accounting, economics and engineering
     majors were in high demand this year.  English majors struggled 
     and the market for education graduates was particularly
     dire amid state and local budget cuts.
     'It really makes a difference what your background is,' says 
     Till Marco von Wachter, a Columbia University economist
     who studied the long-term effect of graduating during a
     recession.  While engineers from top schools can recover
     their earning losses in five years, that's not the case for
     humanities majors at mid-tier colleges.