My college requires nothing for continued access to my college email account- but I’ve never used it or wanted it. I have a personal email account, a work account, and a junk account for coupons from CVS and Ann Taylor. I think a voluntary survey is just that- voluntary.
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@blossom, with all due respect (as you like to say), these are not periodic. These are recent grads - and they show the knowledge rate. That you never responded when you graduated is not relevant. That you can have an email (and I don’t think they had email when you graduated, is not relevant).
So you nor I are a part of the data shown - which shows what % of students are responding. These are specific to graduates of recent years. This would include, for example, my kid from this year and my son in the 2023 report for his school (which didn’t publish usable data or I would have included it).
Pitt, for example, includes 83% of CS grads, UNC 51%. Ga Tech 35%. So yes, only 1/3 of Ga Tech CS grads are included and I noted this. At Rose-Hulman, it’s 100% of students included.
So yes, what % of people it includes is there and if I had to guess (and a guess is all that it is), their success is higher than those that don’t report. You feel otherwise and it’s fine.
But you are not a part of the data but the data is there. Would you rather they not report it so kids/families had less transparency?
I’m sorry you like to think these are erroneous data points but this is the data provided by schools as kids and families, who do look at career outcomes. And many do.
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Yes, hearing roles advertised for hr, admin interns are now paused.
My general concern, what happens to kids who are middle of the pack withtheir GPA?
Hiring top A student college grad may be ok, but what is market for the B-, C+ grad?
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They can report anything and everything. The percentage of graduates who had braces growing up, the BMI of the average faculty member, what percentage of seniors applied for a fellowship (Marshall, Rhodes, Fulbright, etc.) but who did not advance, etc.
It’s on the user to determine whether the data that is reported is useful (which according to you it IS because it’s predictive) and whether it’s not.
We’ve had debates on CC about comparing “campus crime rates” and I (and others) have pointed out that it is generally a useless statistic. Some colleges are proactive and consistent and others are not. So do you want your daughter at a campus where if she tries to report a sexual assault a Dean sits with her and explains that if she reports it to the police it “will follow you forever”, and just encourages her to go home for a long weekend and come back “when you’re ready”? Me- I’d want a college which is vigilant about reporting student on student crime. Many are not. And those that are not generally have much better looking statistics on crime. As fallacious as those statistics are.
This is just one example of the power and failings of statistical misinterpretation. But carry on. You are a fan of ROI and its cousins– and power to you that it’s worked out for your family.
I think the employment reports are certainly valuable. I compared reports across schools using college scorecard and campus employment reports before we applied.
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I’m not in HR but I’ve seen a lot of HR outsourcing at my current company but my old company staffs HR with analytic type people, including one a UIUC engineer with MBA from Chicago. She’s now at a firm in Pittsburgh so not sure how that organization is. So maybe the role has been in transition ?
My current company definitely has contractors because every time I write the HR inbox, each of the 3 people that respond have it on their auto sig. Yet they are the relations and benefits people we see and who present in team meetings, not just a call center. And I know we have employees too - and lots of data related to all the stuff that has become controversial.
My guess is HR roles aren’t what they traditionally were but I know some colleges still offer the major. Others can speak better to it but it’s just my observation.
My post stated highly selective private colleges, and listed highly selective private colleges that were comparable to Stanford (the article I responded to mentioned Stanford in the title). I agree that other colleges may show different patterns, for a variety of different reasons.
As you touched on response rate can vary, as can time period of sampling and definitions of “seeking.” And among those who respond, some do not fill out all survey questions. Its by no means a perfect sample, but it’s what information is available. I’d trust post-grad surveys with a 90% response rate over an article that lists no specific numbers and no anecdotes from the school in the article title.
That said, you do bring up an interest outlier. The 2024 post-grad surveys from the highly selective private colleges I listed showed 1-3% of CS majors seeking work/school. Berkeley’s post grad survey shows 23%… higher than all other colleges you listed. It’s not just CS, all majors at Berkeley show high % seeking. I think the difference is Berkeley surveys seniors about post grad plans before they have graduated, while the others survey after graduation… usually 6 months after graduation. Students are more likely to have a job lined up 6 months after graduation than while a senior prior to graduating.
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My son recently filled out his first destination survey and it looks about 38.9% have reported employment so far. Your explanation makes a lot of sense. With respect to Berkeley I care more about year to year longitudinal trends rather than point specifics.
As a parent of a Berkeley senior, I have access to a lot of anecdata and I think things are actually much better than the general doom and gloom i hear. A ton of kids seem to be sitting on 3+ offers and there seems to be a noticeable uptick in hiring in recent months.
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UCB notes - those cohorts are surveyed on a rolling basis, and are given the opportunity to update their responses for a few months after receiving their degrees.
In the end, schools provide this data and it’s not always transparent - example some may include expected bonuses or signing bonuses. And to your point, UCB may be done prematurely.
Unfortunately, there’s not a standard everyone uses - which should include salary data too.
Amherst shows 6 months after graduation, 4.9% were seeking.
So yes, all use different figures.
People all use rankings differently.
But better to have data, than not, in my opinion.
My kids didn’t use it but I did - even when I got my MBA in the late 90s. At the time, Indiana was #7 in Business Week but would have cost a lot more than #40 ASU. I chose ASU because they paid my tuition + gave me a small stipend for being a recitation leader for an undergrad class.
I saw IU had $2500 higher average salaries, but was placing in Chicago. ASU was placing in lower cost Phoenix and a lot in Denver as well. So I didn’t see a huge issue.
Of course, the data today, from those who are most transparent, goes a lot deeper.
It is, in my opinion, sort of scary though that in this world of data analytics, that the schools professing to teach tomorrow’s experts, do a crappy job themselves in what they provide (likely on purpose, btw because they don’t want the true picture seen).
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That’s for all majors. Among CS grads, Amherst shows 2 students were seeking in 2024, which is up from 1 student seeking in 2022/23. Amherst has too small a sample size draw meaningful conclusions for this stat, which is a common problem when looking at major specific numbers at LACs.
With that qualifier, the list of employers looks different at Amherst than the other selective privates I listed. Other than Amazon, Silicon Valley FAANG-type companies are not well represented in the listed top 20. Only 13% of grads are living in California. Instead the number 2 employer is Prosegraph, which was founded by two Amherst 2024 grads and apparently closed after 3 months. The founders are currently working at Structify and DonorAtlas.
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This is the screen grab - nonetheless, I was just responding to the info you provided up screen. But for those not wanting to believe data (but it doesn’t appear any are current consumers - choosing a school - it doesn’t matter. But for some current consumers, it might.
Prior to the recent edit, your original post listed a different rate. My bigger point was 4.8% is only 2 students. An increase from 1 student in 2023 to 2 students in 2024 is not a meaningful distinction.
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That’s fair - just showing what they have. Yes, I think I typo’d the # so i fixed it.
All I’m doing is showing what the schools show (like you did). Some people take offense to that.
Then they shouldn’t use the data but of course people that graduated 30 or 40 years ago and have no kids in the college section zone aren’t the audiences for those reports anyway.
And, of some importance to this discussion, some colleges have robust followup and others do not.
There is a nonmajority but solid number of colleges (mostly LACs, because they have smaller numbers to follow up on, but not exclusively) with >90% response rates for postgraduation placement surveys.
One should take care when generalizing from one’s own experience to the wider population.
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I have no problem comparing two colleges with similar size classes and over 90% response rate. That is materially different from comparing Berkeley to a school one tenth of its size and concluding (without acknowledging the important point that the timing of a survey matters pre-vs. post graduation) that CS at Berkeley is problematic. Maybe it is. But not based on that one datapoint.
I’m not generalizing from my own experience to the entire world of college graduates. I’m pointing out that glib interpretations (i.e. a low response rate means all those kids are unemployed or underemployed which is why they don’t respond) are rarely correct and rarely produce predictive results. Because to be honest- nobody cares a fig about the 11,999 graduates who have answered a survey. You care because you want YOUR KID to be the one who lands a job- a good job– and you want “data” that shows that your kid will be that one if only s/he majors in the right discipline at the right school with the right internships.
That’s why you care. And I can tell you from decades of experience hiring new grads, that there is no silver bullet. No major which will protect your kid from down economy or recession. No college which will guarantee a fabulous career if the employment market shifts due to a black swan event. No GPA, no internship, no dissertation topic which is so desirable that it will guarantee the result folks on here want to guarantee. Will AI mean fewer jobs? Maybe. Will AI mean fewer jobs for CS majors? Maybe. Does that mean your kid should major in petroleum engineering instead? God no. Don’t trade one volatile sector for an even MORE volatile sector.
Like I said upthread- you want a guarantee, go to West Point. Your employer will be waiting at the gates for you after your graduation ceremony. And it will be years before you need to worry about finding another job.
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Yep- looks like it’s time again to remind folks of the limitations of self report/outcome reports. Many well respected sources cited here have explained the limitations in terms most can understand. Problems and limitations with College career outcome reports: reading between the lines
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I almost never fill out surveys but I did encourage my boys to fill out those from their college regarding employment after graduation - I thought it would be helpful for prospective students and they did as well.
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My daughter’s company ended up doing a downsizing of one of their plants but offered their young engineers a relo package to go to other sites. I was so happy to hear that people weren’t being let go! As such, my daughter’s site gained another young person which they are excited about.
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I love companies that try not to lay off. I worked for one, we even kept someone on a PIP - which I never understood.
I, myself, left my company in a forced move (from TN to SC). I wouldn’t have left if I hadn’t found another job locally.
But I always tell everyone who says - it’s horrible what they did to me - force me to move after so many years - I tell them how appreciative I was.
My name isn’t on the building. They eliminated my job (and a host of others) and offered everyone of us another role. They didn’t need to do that.
Some were offered roles a level below - but they were offered positions and a chance to support their families.
That says a lot about a company. Sounds like your daughter found a great one!!
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Some timely advice for the CS kids…
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