Job Picture Bright for Class of '08
Posted on: Sunday, 11 May 2008, 09:00 CDT
By Monica Chen, The Herald-Sun, Durham, N.C.
May 11--DURHAM -- For the fresh-faced and hopeful students who will toss their caps in the air at Duke University and UNC Chapel Hill's commencements today, there is a silver lining in this economy: For the class of 2008, the job market is still looking good.
Despite news of a stagnant economy all around them this year, as many as a third of this year's graduates have already found jobs and two-thirds already have plans for work or graduate school, according to career counselors at both universities.
The picture is also surprisingly bright for students heading into business-related fields, showing that despite the collapse of the housing market in many parts of the country and an anxiety-ridden Wall Street this spring, the demand for workers is still strong.
Take Dawn Morrow, a student at UNC's Kenan-Flagler Business School who is graduating today with a dual MBA and master's degree in health administration.
Morrow has taken a position with the FBI as an internal consultant, and she's not the only one with a job, she said this week. Many of her classmates were snapped up by companies and organizations as early as December.
"Pretty much, the people I know are employed for the most part," she said. When asked if those who focused on investment banking or real estate have been nervous about heading into those troubled industries, Morrow said that for the most part, they are choosing to stay in their fields.
"I think that at the end of the day, regardless of the economy, students will still chase their dream jobs (or the jobs they think will lead to their dream job) because that's really what we all came back for," she said in an e-mail.
Jeff Fischer, director of the MBA Career Management Center at UNC, said business school students broadened their searches and networked more aggressively this year to get the jobs they want.
"They've been very proactive, as opposed to a bull market phenomenon, where a student could wait for a bank to come on campus," Fischer said. "My judgment is that a lot of students will do something different to find the job they want. They're not looking at the market and saying, 'Forget this.'"
At both schools, Bear Stearns was apparently the only company that reneged on its hires after imploding in March from problems with subprime mortgages. However, the impact of the company's withdrawal was negligible, affecting fewer than five students at Duke. UNC numbers were not available.
And although the banking industry in particular has been hammered with news of planned layoffs in recent months -- 4,000 from Citigroup, 4,000 from Merrill Lynch and 5,500 from Swiss giant UBS -- the layoffs could actually benefit new graduates.
Many banks will continue hiring even in a bear market because they compete with each other to recruit fresh talent early, and entry-level positions are less costly to the corporate bottom line than mid-level workers.
"In many ways, a hire going into an investment bank in a tough market, when that bank is cutting people and the market turns, they can be better positioned than they would've been in a strong market," Fischer said. "If you're a young, rising banker and there are fewer people in front of you because of cuts last year, you can rise up faster."
At Duke, hiring of students heading into financing actually increased from 24 percent in 2007 to 33 percent in 2008, according to Sheila Curran, director of the Career Center.
That's not to say that the anxieties of a recession aren't still scratching at the confidence of students and their parents.
Marcia Harris, director of University Career Services at UNC, said that although the final tally of graduates and their plans won't be available for months, she would not be surprised if the total number of students going directly to graduate school jumps from 20 percent in previous years to 30 percent this year.
The number of organizations recruiting at UNC was the highest in six years, but many students were not aware of them, Harris said.
"The students and parents were concerned. I think many students accepted job offers earlier than usual," she said. "I feel that this year, it was more the perception that if they had the good fortune of a job, they should go with it."
That might have contributed to the strong showing of Teach for America at both universities this year. The national organization connects graduates with two-year teaching positions in low-income communities.
It hired about 100 graduates from Duke and UNC and was the biggest employer of Duke graduates this year as well as in 2007. Ten percent of Duke's senior class applied with the organization this year. At UNC, 5 percent of the graduating class applied.
The economy plays a small role in the popularity of the organization, said Alex Quigley, executive director of Teach for America's East North Carolina region. Quigley added that the increase was mostly because of effective recruiting efforts in recent years.
Citing a Duke graduate who has a 3.9 GPA and majored in biochemistry and women's studies, Quigley said, "The people that are accepting our offer, a lot of the times, they have multiple job offers. We're not meeting people who are saying, 'I can't find a job, so I'll go into Teach for America.'"
Whether anxieties about the job market are unfounded or not, once a job is secured, it's likely the graduate will be making about 5.3 percent more than he or she would have in 2007, according to the National Association of Colleges and Employers' spring survey.
The computer science industry showed the biggest jump, with a 14.7 percent increase to $59,873 this year in average salaries for new graduates. Offers were highest for those who went into software design and development, topping out at $65,379.
Liberal arts graduates also fared well. Their average salary offers rose 12.9 percent to $35,378. Engineering majors also saw respectable gains, with an average increase of 6 percent to $65,258.
By comparison, undergraduate business students reported a small increase of 1.5 percent in gains from last year. Accounting graduates of 2008 saw no change from 2007. Business administration/management graduates received a miniscule increase of 0.3 percent.
And a word of caution for rising seniors: Counselors and students say the job market might actually be tougher on the class of 2009.
"Companies will feel the strain this year because of the economy and that will affect how they staff and recruit the year after," Morrow predicted.
But like this year, future graduates will keep following their dreams.
Sarah Wolper, a rising junior in the news-editorial sequence of UNC's journalism school, said in an e-mail, "From what I've heard, news-ed is one of the less lucrative career options ..., but I'm not overly concerned."
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