Helpful links

As admitted students become more interested in statistics like job placement, internships, average starting salaries, etc., it is important to keep up-to-date with Notre Dame's information in these areas. Below are some links to help answer questions and guide your conversations with students.

Future Plans Data

Based on an annual survey of graduating seniors, The Career Center complies a profile for graduates of each individual college and also the University as a whole. The most recent numbers -- for the class of 2008 -- show that, at graduation, only 2% of graduates were still seeking employment (meaning 98% were placed in employment, graduate/professional school, service programs or the military).

A bit further down on that page is the average starting salary for students based on college.

Below that might be the most helpful information on the page. If you click on one of the majors, you will find a profile of future plans for students graduating in that academic area. For example, clicking Chemical Engineering will show you that 67% of Class of 2008 graduates had full-time employment plans, 25% planned on furthering their education, and 8% were going into service. The average starting salary of the 24 chemical engineers who reported a figure was $62,346, and the employers, graduate schools and service organizations are also listed.

This example would be a great opportunity to explain to a student that, although Notre Dame may not be known as an "engineering school", graduates from that college are still incredibly well prepared for their future endeavors.

Internship Survey Data

Students also want to know about internships -- they may not know what they are, but it's a question that is almost always asked as they search for the right college. The link above will take you to a page with more information than you could ever want about internships (broken down by college, year in school, geographic location, pay type, experience type, etc.).

This page, like the one for job placement, will also break down the information by major.

College Salary Report

Last summer, payscale.com conducted a survey to determine the "best investment" for an undergraduate education. 1.2 million users of the website reported their salaries and education credentials, and those without an advanced degree were considered in the final figures (to determine the value of the undergraduate education).

Notre Dame ranked eighth on the list, with a median mid-career salary of $121,000 and a starting median salary of $55,300.

If there are any other questions we can answer, or information we can provide, please do not hesitate to let me know!

The Priest President

Today's edition of The Chronicle of Higher Education has a nice, in-depth profile on Father Jenkins. As expected, much of the article discusses the controversy surrounding the invitation to President Obama last year, though it also covers Father Jenkins as a person and the identity of Notre Dame.

If you do not have a subscription to The Chronicle, a .pdf version of the article is linked here.

A direct link to the article (for subscribers--a subscription is free) is here.

Two weeks of posts in one

After being out of town for two weeks, I came back to an inbox full of e-mails. Instead of posting each of these separately, I've decided to condense everything into one post:

• An interesting article from The Chronicle of Higher Education about honorary degrees, our commencement this year, and Fr. Hesburgh.
• An article from USA Today about nation-wide graduation rates. It's scary to think that only 53% of students starting college will graduate in six years! We are very fortunate to be in a position where 95% of our students will graduate in four years.
• A survey that shows what we expected: this year, students were more likely to choose a school based on affordability rather than choosing their "dream school."

Sorry to bunch the links together, but there is some good-albeit diverse-reading here!

Graduation Recap

The University has uploaded videos from yesterday's commencement ceremony to this website.  There you can find everything from the Valedictory Address to President Obama's Commencement Address.

Congratulations Class of 2009!

Letter to graduating seniors from Fr. Jenkins

You may have received this in an e-mail from the Alumni Association yesterday, but ealier this week, Fr. Jenkins sent this letter to all graduating seniors, addressing their graduation and President Obama as the commencement speaker.

President Obama to speak at Commencement

As you may or may not have heard by now, President Barack Obama will be the principal speaker at the University Commencement Ceremony this May.  President Obama is the sixth President of the United States to speak at graduation, the last being President George W. Bush in 2001.  

The full press release is here.  

What are you doing next year?

Seniors absolutely love to be asked the magical question, "What are you doing next year?" as they complete their college studies and prepare for the real world. But in all seriousness, what are Notre Dame graduates doing after college?

In the past, our office was asked what percentage of our graduates were "placed"--in a job, graduate school, service work, the military, etc.--after graduation. Notre Dame, quite proudly, boasts a nearly-100% placement rate for its graduates within six months of graduation.

More recently, however (perhaps because of our current economic situation), the placement questions are becoming more pointed. Instead of asking the percentage of our graduates who are placed, prospective students and parents are now asking WHAT our graduates are doing after Notre Dame (for example, I often get the question "What do you do with a degree in Political Science?").

The Career Center has an amazing website which not only provides the placement statistics for classes as a whole, with 2007 as the most recent, but also allows you to search their data by college and major. This is a great tool to share with prospective students and parents and probably contains more information than they will ever want.

Here's a link to the site: http://careercenter.nd.edu/about-us/career-and-internship-data/future-plans-data

Graduation

Some of you may have been lucky enough to attend graduation this past weekend. My family did not have a ticket for me, so while I was home, cleaning and anxiously awaiting their arrival, Cardinal Theodore E. McCarrick spoke to the over 2,900 graduates. Details of Cardinal McCarrick's speech can be found here.

Actor Martin Sheen (who, as President Bartlet on "The West Wing", played a Notre Dame grad), received the Laetare Medal for his humanitarian work during the ceremony.

According to my sources inside the ceremony, both speeches were entertaining, insightful and not sleep-inducing.