<p>
</p>
<p>Are you suggesting that the long term optimal level of bachelor’s degree holders in the population 25 years old and up is about 3% (10% of the current 30%)? Note that prior to the great increase in university enrollment from the 1950s to 1970s, it was about 10%.</p>
<p>Well, there is not a state in this country I have not been and have lived in at least 10 of them and not always in big cities. Spent my first 18 years in a small rural NJ area where the nearest town was 5 miles and had just 5000 people. My parents contributed $0 to my education because they had just enough to get by as both were non HS grad immigrants earning less than $10k per year and they had 3 kids. There were some months in Madison I lived on mostly surplus USA peanut butter and cheese. I rented out my room and paid my roommates a small amount to stay and sleep on the sofa. Nobody promised it was going to be easy.
Even lived in Dekalb IL for a time. </p>
<p>If you read my post one major item besides closing poorly performing colleges is increasing fin aid well above current levels. Nice thing about better schools is they can raise more money for such things and have actual endowments. What is the endowment at EIU? I’d rather your nephew get the $$$ needed to go to UIUC because he would be better off graduating from there over EIU. Met plenty of UIUC grads working in Chicago in finance. There are many in Seattle at Boeing and Microsoft, etc.</p>
<p>No UCBA, that was just my number for “top quality schools”. I suggested closing the bottom 25% leaving 75%–not 10%. That’s still millions of grads.</p>
<p>Maybe I’m wrong, but I think the point that Barrons has been trying to make all along is this: all things being equal, the so-called ‘3rd tier’ colleges (and I even take that with a grain of salt) are having a tough time because for the most part the value isn’t there anymore. OK, EIU specializes in teaching degrees? Teaching jobs overall are in decline, so there are your empty dorms, which is an inherent problem with directional U.'s. If that field is hurting, the school is too. </p>
<p>And it’s a matter of cost vs. value too. The local CC we have (College of Lake County <il>) is filled to capacity & good for them because they provide value as a stepping stone to finishing up at a U. with most of not all credits transferring at a much lower cost. Increasingly, I think parents MUST look farther out timewise to spot employment trends before signing their Johnny off to somewhere for 4 years at $20K. And let’s face it–a plain old undergraduate degree is not a guaranteed golden ticket anymore.</il></p>
<p>If I were doing it again, and my kid didn’t have the stats (or I hadn’t saved the money) to get into a top 100 U., I would have no problem with her starting at a 2-year CC while she works & earns & finds her way & then maybe transfers to finish her degree. I’m sure many are following this path right now.</p>
<p>Can we deal with facts here? EIU does not “specialize in teaching degrees.”</p>
<p>2011 spring graduation:</p>
<p>Bachelor of Arts 442 39%
Bachelor of Fine Arts 21 2%
Bachelor of Music 19 2%
Bachelor of Science 282 25%
Bachelor of Science in Business 193 17%
Bachelor of Science in Education 178 16%
Total Bachelor’s Degrees 1135 100%</p>
<p>Master of Arts 46 17%
Master of Business Administration 23 9%
Master of Science 131 49%
Master of Science in Education 68 25%
Total Master’s Degrees 268 100%</p>
<p>[source: EIU press release, <a href=“http://www.eiu.edu/gradlist/][/url”>Graduates | Eastern Illinois University][/url</a>]</p>
<p>Teaching was mentioned as one of their strengths and an appeal of the school-to point out that one of the stronger programs of the school is now less valuable given economic conditions is a reasonable explanation for a declining value of a diploma and declining enrollment.
I would have chosen my CC over a school equivalent to EIU to add to that discussion.</p>
<p>Just 1 quick comparison</p>
<p>Avg starting salalry</p>
<p>Accting
UIUC $53,000
EIU-$40,400</p>
<p>Finance</p>
<p>UIUC $52,300</p>
<p>EIU $36,556</p>
<p>Plus many UI grads get signing and annual guaranteed bonus</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>Most EIU graduates do just that. According to the CDS, in the fall of 2010 they enrolled 561 first-time freshmen and 1147 transfer students. I would wager that almost all the transfers were from CCs. Illinois public universities have a robust program of establishing relationships with community colleges and creating articulation programs.</p>
<p>
</p>
<p>So is that your evidence to support your assertion, “Why waste $$$ on a worthless degree from a 3rd tier school. Better off learning a trade.”</p>
<p>If so, if I had the time and the inclination, I’d do a comparison of average starting salaries of Harvard finance grads and University of Wisconsin finance grads. I could then draw the same conclusion about UW degrees.</p>
<p>If anyone finds useful by-major career survey information for various schools, it may be worthwhile to add it to this thread:</p>
<p><a href=“http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/internships-careers-employment/1121619-university-graduate-career-surveys.html[/url]”>http://talk.collegeconfidential.com/internships-careers-employment/1121619-university-graduate-career-surveys.html</a></p>
<p>Maybe but at least the UW grads earn a nice living wage similar to UI’s. BTW there is no finance ug at Harvard. And UW does well as the school for Fortune 500 CEOs. So at least you have a shot. So :</p>
<p>“Large state institutions like the University of Wisconsin—Madison, the University of Michigan—Ann Arbor, and Ohio State University ranked highly as well, as each awarded at least 10 degrees to CEOs on Fortune’s list. Wisconsin stood out among its state school peers, granting 17 degrees to the CEOs, which put the school fourth overall”</p>
<p>"Wisconsin Ties Harvard in Producing Top CEOs</p>
<p>Two universities have the most graduates who are top chief executive officers, according to a new study. They are the University of Wisconsin and Harvard.</p>
<p>This is the latest finding by executive recruitment company SpencerStuart. The firm annually examines the educational backgrounds of the CEOs of Standard & Poor’s 500 companies.</p>
<p>Harvard and the University of Wisconsin tied with 13 undergraduate alumni each on the list as of April 18, 2008.</p>
<p>Last year, there was a three-way tie among Harvard, Princeton and Wisconsin. Prior to 2004, Harvard alone was the most common school attended by top CEOs.</p>
<p>This is not the first time that Wisconsin has ranked with its Ivy League counterparts in terms of producing business leaders. In previous years, BusinessWeek and Bloomberg Markets also have found Wisconsin to be among the top producers of CEOs of major corporations"</p>
<p>How many graduates does UW have? How many does Harvard have? Princeton?</p>
<p>ROFL. I’m guessing you didn’t major in statistics. At least, for the sake of the reputation of the statistics profs at UW, I hope not.</p>
<p>1 in 8 of all Wabash graduates carry the title CEO, President or Chairman at one time during theier careers. Based on that, this little LAC is kicking both Harvard and UW to the curb. Does anyone (other than my S )think it is a better school than Harvard?</p>
<p>TOPS ALL STATE U’s ROFL. I’ll take that just fine sir. How many H and P grads go into teaching or nursing or ag as many UW grads do. UW produces a much broader array of people for different jobs just as it admits a broader array. And its top grads can compete with grads from anywhere. For the number of grads WITH elite level stats comparable to those kids at H or P, UW does quite well–and better than most of its state U peers. So there.</p>
<p>OK, then if you want to stay in-category, compare EIU to the other non-flagship state Us, not to a flagship. I don’t have the time; if you want to amuse yourself, go ahead.</p>
<p>And to claim that any state flagship is equivalent to a top-ranked private in any measure other than size and athletic budget is simply ludicrous.</p>
<p>Really, barrons, a UW person doesn’t have the standing to be so uppity and elite about Illinois directionals. From your description of what you enjoyed at UW, it was mostly the out of control, heavy drinking, barfing on the neighbors’ lawn aspect of UW. (well, the neighbors deserved it, college kids need to have their fun.)</p>
<p>Please don’t let barrons represent my state or UW. btw- how about all of those tier 4 schools? Many Illinois residents are willing to pay OOS tuition to go to UW, it would be more interesting to hear from those UW alumni than barrons and his out of touch with the area offensive commentary. MY NJ college friend was so different than barrons. Only a small percentage of UW students are in the business school, and most in business as a career did not major in business as undergrads. Those L&S grads get around.</p>
<p>Most people don’t care about their job chances outside of their own area. Most are quite content to stay put near family and friends. The nation exists for them just as much as it does for the wheelers and dealers (or wannabe’s). Check on state medical and law schools- their student bodies include many grads from schools disdained as not be elite by some. It is nice to be grounded in an area instead of floating around the country for many.</p>
<p>This thread taught me a new term- I was unaware of how Illinois ordered its colleges- “directional” isn’t used just north of its border. Interesting how different states choose to organize things.</p>
<p>HUH?? Where do you ever get that? All I said about that is that if you live in a university downtown where there are lots of students you better expect it not to be like a quiet suburb. I had my fun but rarely drank heavily while in school. I was one of the few very sober ones at the football games. I was more likely to be at a foreign film showing than barfing up my drinks. The OOS kids did not drink like the locals.</p>
<p>Well annasdad–apparently a few do compare. Nobel prizes–yup–Pulitzer prizes–lots, faculty with memberships in top academic societies and doing top research–yup. Maybe you don’t know as much as you think. </p>
<p>National Academy members–UW 72, Cornell 61, Northwestern 38, Duke 54, Chicago 52, Brown 45. </p>
<p>And so on. Same for faculty winning major awards, research awards, etc etc.</p>
<p>News flash for Wis75, Most UW-Madison grads do not live in Wisconsin. Not even close. The number is under 40%–37.6% at last report and falling.</p>