Some college grads write own ticket
Engineering majors among those doing well in job market
By Janet Forgrieve, Special to the Rocky
Published May 22, 2008 at 7 p.m.
Photo by Preston Gannaway / The Rocky
Tracy Dong, 24, a new test engineer at Raytheon in Aurora, graduated from Cornell University with a master's degree in mechanical engineering and set her sights on living in Colorado. She said her salary at Raytheon is better than she expected.
Growing stacks of jobs reports ranging from slightly scary to decidedly bleak have recent college graduates thinking about moving into parents' basements.
But for those with some flexibility and resumes that have some depth, the options look brighter.
"It's a myth that it's a tough time for college grads to get jobs," said Michael Deragisch, assistant director of career services for the University of Colorado.
Graduates in certain majors, including engineering, computer science and accounting, may be writing their own tickets. Degree holders in other areas, including communications and liberal arts, must be more flexible about what they'll consider, he said.
Come prepared
And, as some companies become slower and more thoughtful in their hiring, it's more important than ever for graduates to come prepared with internships under their belts and a realistic picture of what their first jobs - and paychecks - will look like.
"There are college grads who will tell you there's nothing out there for them," Deragisch said. "And it's true that, if you're holding a liberal arts degree and you want to start at $50,000 a year with a west-facing window, there probably is nothing."
Graduates prepared to start at the beginning and work their way up are much more likely to land jobs like those offered by Enterprise Rent-A-Car's management trainee program, which recruits at CU every year. Enterprise expects to add 8,500 new graduates this year, including about 140 in Colorado.
Starting salaries for graduates vary geographically, said Marie Artim, Enterprise's assistant vice president of recruiting. New graduates at Enterprise in Colorado earn between $32,000 and $34,000.
Motivated trainees begin at the store level and quickly work their way up, earning raises and promotions as they go, said Artim, who began as a trainee herself.
"We have seen a pretty competitive job market for entry-level grads coming out of college," she said. "It's probably a little slower than it was a year ago, but it's definitely more competitive than it was three years ago."
A recent national survey of employers revealed that, while companies have cut back the number of new workers they expect to hire this year, they still plan to grow. In the fall, employers surveyed by the National Association of Colleges and Employers said they expected to add 16 percent more staff this year. By spring, that growth number fell by half, to 8 percent.
Colorado School of Mines is seeing the same companies recruiting on campus as in years past, but many are looking to fill fewer positions than last year, said Ron Brummett, the school's career services director.
Not 'quite the number'
"We're not seeing quite the number of interviews or quite the number of targets they need to fill - instead of 30 engineers, they're maybe looking for 20," he said.
Tracy Dong began her nationwide job search last summer, months before earning her master's degree in mechanical engineering at Cornell University in Ithaca, N.Y.
"I was able to find some things, but I knew I wanted to be in Colorado, so I decided not to settle for any of those other jobs," said Dong, 24.
Instead, after graduation, she applied at Colorado companies and made the trip west to be on the spot for interviews. One of the first to call her in was Raytheon's Intelligence and Information Systems Space Systems division in Aurora, where she was hired from a field of about 100 applicants to fill one of 24 positions for new graduates.
Dong declined to specify her starting salary but said it was competitive with offers her peers were receiving and was better than she expected.
Both CU's Deragisch and Mines' Brummett agree that starting salaries across the board appear to be rising only slightly this year, though full data won't be available until about November.
At Mines, the average offer for bachelor's degree holders in all disciplines last year was $59,102, with graduates in some sought-after majors winning much bigger paychecks. This year's preliminary numbers show an approximate increase of 5 percent compared with an 11 percent jump last year, Brummett said.
Graduates with internships under their belts have a leg up in the job search, according to a recent survey by the National Association of Colleges and Employers.
About 95 percent of employers responding to the Job Outlook 2008 survey said they consider such experience when hiring.
The number of available internships can also be a key indicator of what's really going on in the job market, said Brummett, who has worked in the school's career services office for 15 years.
Internships available
During previous downturns, internships were the first thing to dry up, he said. This time around, that's not happening. If anything, companies are expanding their internship programs, likely with an eye on replacing retiring baby boomers who are expected to leave the work force in droves during the next decade
Raytheon plans to double the size of its internship program starting this summer and will expand it to reach out to recent high school graduates as a way to get them considering the company early on.
Biggest payoffs
Top-paid majors for 2007-08 bachelor's degree graduates*
Curriculum Avg. Salary Offer
* Chemical engineering $63,616
* Computer engineering $59,962
* Computer science $59,873
* Industrial/manufacturing engineering $58,252
* Aerospace/aeronautical/astronautical engineering $57,999 Entry-level opportunities
Top 10 entry-level employers, by 2008 projected national entry- level hires
1 Enterprise Rent-A-Car, 8,500 (8,000 in 2007)
2 AmeriCorps, 6,000 (7,000)
3 Walgreen Co., 5,924 (5,383)
4 Internal Revenue Service, 5,000 (2,000)
5 Progressive Insurance, 4,208 (2,958) 6 Teach for America, 3,700 (2,900)
7 Deloitte & Touche USA LLP, 3,500 (3,500)
8 Target, 3,358 (3,259)
9 Peace Corps, 3,276 (3,181)
10 Ernst & Young, 3,180 (3,100)
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May 23, 2008
7:14 a.m.
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vudumom writes:
New T-shirt for college grad parents. I paid $60,000 for my kid to go to college and all I got was this lousy T-shirt and a liberal arts major working at Walgreens.
May 23, 2008
8:06 a.m.
psu96 writes:
(This comment was removed by the site staff.)
May 23, 2008
8:21 a.m.
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athought writes:
This is why parents shouldn't pay for their kid's college. If people pay their own way through school, they'd probably pick a more profitable major such as the sciences or engineering. I disagree with the starting offers for ChE's though. Most of the ones I have seen are 45-50k which is better than the 35-45k I saw in the early 2000's.
May 23, 2008
8:22 a.m.
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Scott writes:
My first degree is an AASEET from Southeast Community College in Milford, Nebraska. Back in the 90s during a visit back home, Lincoln, I stopped into a convenience store to make a purchase. The customer ahead of me was a nut case, not dangerous, just nutty. After that customer left I looked at the cashier with a quizzical expression on my face.
She replied: "Oh that's nothing. You should be here at midnight! I could write a book about it. Actually I should, I have a degree in journalism."
I darn near bit a hole through my tongue. This person had spent their parents (or maybe their own) money on a Lib Arts degree so that they could be a cashier at a "Stop-n-Rob". From that point forward when I counsoled or recruited at SCC Milford I would tell the joke, "What does a UNL grad say to a Milford grad? Ya want fries with that?" Then I would relate the afore mentioned story.
Scott
May 23, 2008
8:27 a.m.
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dlwr writes:
It is so true though. If you don't go to college it is very difficult to get a job. If you don't go to college for something specific and meaningful you still can't get a job. By the way if you're only paying $60,000, you did great. Imagine paying over $160,000 and still having the same problem.
May 23, 2008
8:31 a.m.
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Scott writes:
athought,
In general I agree with you. However, it really depends upon the kid. My eldest picked up an animation and graphic design degree from AIC. AIC is way overpriced, but it was the only school in the Denver area that offered the program. She is now gainfully employed in her career field. My youngest daughter just graduated from Metro with an accounting degree. Accountants are in more demand that nurses! So yes, dear ol' dad paid for both of his kids education. However, they knew from an early age that I would NOT pay for some worthless draft dodger degree, e.g. philosophy, fine arts, journalism, etc..
BTW, I did pay for my associates degree via the GI Bill.
Scott
May 23, 2008
8:48 a.m.
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Bagel writes:
athought, I think your numbers are a bit low. When I graduated 6 years ago ChemE's from my school were getting offers of 50-55, and that was in Indiana. I can't imagine it's gone down significantly, especially in a much more expensive state like Colorado.
May 23, 2008
10:18 a.m.
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jcn7vc writes:
I graduated in Dec with a Metallurgical Engineering degree. I can tell you that the job market for Metallurgists is booming, mostly because no one knows about it and it is one of the most demanded commodities. A lot of ChemE's are able to pick up Met and Petroleum jobs because of the lack of those disciplines, and they can pay between $60K-$85K, especially if you are away from a big city. That is the reason why they the average is so high.
May 23, 2008
10:40 a.m.
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athought writes:
Scott, kudos to you on raising bright children. I knew more than a few fellow students in Montana that went to university and did nothing but drink beer and watch TV. They graduated with Liberal Arts degrees while I got killed with physical chemistry (which is actually quantum mechanics) and thermodynamics. I believe kids get an LA degree if their parents just harp on "college, college, college" not "job, job, job". It offers some of the easiest classwork around which allows for dating, drinking beer every night, riotting and other typical CU student behavior shown on TV.
Bagel, what colleges claim students get and what the majority actually earn are two separate things. I graduated in 2000 and 1/2 the class had no offers and the offers I knew of were in the 35-45k range. Students could break 50k but they were in a co-op program. It was 1 semester classes, 1 semester working and a really good deal if you could get in. The university claimed an average of 48k but it wasn't realistic as 25 students had near $0 the first 6 months post grad including 1 of the 4 top honors students in the class. BTW, my first job out of college was a bank teller making $7.50/hr and took nearly a year to get my first engineering job.
May 23, 2008
10:51 a.m.
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Scott writes:
Once again Froward69 is showing his abject hatred and stupidity towards members of the U.S. Military. The G.I. Bill was part of a contract that I signed with the U.S. Government. For allowing the U.S. Government to do with me as they saw fit for a five year period I was compensated with training as a parachute rigger, a below poverty level wage and the G.I. Bill. I held up my end of the contract and the taxpayers (via the U.S. Government) held up their end. It's called "Capitalism". It's lot different from what you bow to, socialism.
To the humans on this blog: Below I'm going to toot my own horn. This is NOT to impress you, but to put liberal idiots, e.g. Froward69, in its place.
That cashier at the Stop-n-Rob would have been making close to minimum wage. In the mid 90's I was working at Bell Telephone Laboratories making about $60k per year. At that point I had been awarded about 5 patents, I now have 13 patents. Oh, and today? I now have a Bachelors in electronics with a math minor. I work in aerospace and pull down $132,000/year. I didn't keep in touch with that journalism major ;-)
Scott
May 23, 2008
11:09 a.m.
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Bagel writes:
athought, I'm sorry you had a bad experience. Maybe you should've considered Indiana. Most of my friends (including my brother) got great jobs at Eli Lilly right out of school.
I'm not quoting school's statistics either, I'm quoting friends and family (I went to an all-engineering school).
May 23, 2008
11:11 a.m.
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Bagel writes:
Scott, I also work in aerospace. I'm an optics geek.
May 23, 2008
11:34 a.m.
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athought writes:
Bagel, I only considered Montana St. (in-state tuition used to be dirt cheap) and CU (I liked the football team but wouldn't have fit in). The reason my class had such a bad time was the .com bust and about 15 students out of the 25 no-offers wanted to go into semiconductors. I wound up going into petroleum instead which is paying off now. I am pretty happy about where I am today financially and professionally even though I had to fight to get here. It makes me appreciate what I have which I don't think some of the young engineering grads do.
Scott, thank you for serving your country. I don't mind having my taxes increased for better vet's benefits but hate it when my money goes to a bridge to nowhere and whatever building/center/money pit/pork museum Sen. Byrd can build in West Virginia.
May 23, 2008
11:36 a.m.
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Bagel writes:
I've been laid off before, so I definitely appreciate having a job. Most engineering jobs are pretty risky, depending on the market. Aerospace has been in a slump for a few years now.
May 23, 2008
11:42 a.m.
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gs writes:
My oldest son has an undergraduate degree in Bio-something or other from Lehigh. He has a good background in medical research and it sounded like he did some good research on Alzhimers while in school. Now, in Denver, work is difficult to find for him. Are there any suggestions out there? Life is better when he is working.
May 23, 2008
11:57 a.m.
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Scott writes:
athought: I and all vets appreciate your thanks. Also, from your previous posting, you and I are in total agreement. I have two cousins that were preached the college-college-college. Their job status illustrates your comments to a T. Also, the "bridge to nowhere" and the Klan, err I mean turd-bird museum.
Bagel: What town do you work in? I'm in Boulder. Regarding lay offs. I got canned from BTL when they sent my job, and 119 others, off to Commie China (I hear Froward69 typing right now ;-). Yes, my present employer is currently on the knife's edge.
Scott
May 23, 2008
12:16 p.m.
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athought writes:
gs: I spoke with one of our vendors yesterday who does some of that industry work and he stated that the pharma industry in CO is on a downward trend right now. The best he can do is keep all of his options open and be willing to relocate out of his own pocket for a job. If he can do so, he should say so. Also, look for positions where he can apply what he already has in a different area or field. I went from oil refining to military fuels to natural gas. If an industry is sinking, you can't be picky about your next boat.
May 23, 2008
12:39 p.m.
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Bagel writes:
Boulder for me as well.
May 23, 2008
12:43 p.m.
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Scott writes:
Bagel,
If you work for who I think you do I'm in Building AR-1 room 103.
Scott
May 23, 2008
12:53 p.m.
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Bagel writes:
LOL
CO3, room?
May 23, 2008
3:08 p.m.
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Scott writes:
JMac,
WOW! And my youngest, the accountant, considered that.
Scott
May 23, 2008
6:41 p.m.
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BrandiWine_84 writes:
I honestly think it has to do with what the grad is willing to do to get a good job. The jobs are out there, some very lucrative opportunities, but they have to be found. Many times grads are expecting the opportunites to seek them out, but they ought to realize that the important things in life shouldn't come easy. I graduated a year ago, and I am not yet ready to make the full transition into the grown-up world, but I know what I need to do when I am ready