<hool year is coming to a rapid close and with that the 2014 seniors are being forced out of the comfort of the Carleton bubble and into the real world. This week, I randomly polled 90 of those graduating seniors to see what their plans were for next year. Some 32 of them do not yet know what their next step is, 46 are going straight into the work world and 12 are going directly to graduate school.
On average, it is taking students longer and longer to find permanent jobs, and more students are taking time off before attending– graduate school. Although only 12 of the students polled are immediately going to continue their education on average 62.1% of Carls complete some sort of post-graduate degree throughout their life. Of that number, 21.1% went on to receive a PhD.
From 1990 to 2013 this has been the most common post graduate degree to receive, however, this stat is closely followed by 18.6% receiving an MA. The most common place to receive these degrees is from the University of Minnesota, by more than double that of any other graduate school in any field of study. Additionally, 100% of Carls report to have jobs if they are looking for work. This could be a skewed statistic, however. The survey is sent out to all alums, and the unemployed may not want to report their work status back to their alma mater.
Seniors may be reading this and asking, “How does this apply to me?” The economy is extremely fickle, and as a generation we have been trained to believe that our generation is going to have a harder time finding employment than our parents did. However, Carleton has been around for 148 years now, and has done a pretty decent job helping to prepare Carls for the real world.