There's no job guarantee in a college degree
By Lucy Lazarony • Bankrate.com

Memo to parents and students: A four-year college degree just isn't what it used to be.

That ornate college diploma still may look impressive, but it has lost much of its clout in the career marketplace. Back in the 1960s, a college degree was a virtual guarantee of professional and managerial success.

It's not anymore.

These days, there are more people with four-year degrees than commensurate employment. A bachelor's degree is no longer a golden ticket to the good life.

Consider these statistics from Kenneth C. Gray, a professor of work force education and development at Penn State University:

• Only 23 percent of work in the 21st century requires a four-year academic degree or higher.
  
  
• Forty-three percent of four-year college grads are underemployed, which means they have jobs that do not utilize their degrees.
  
  
• Sixty-seven percent of college grads with degrees in arts and sciences are underemployed.

Throw in the fact that job opportunities for people with bachelor's degrees have remained flat in the past year, and it's clear many recent college grads are in for some tough times ahead.

And yet many teens and parents still view a four-year college degree as the one-and-only path to career success.

"A bachelor's degree means a lot to a lot of people even though a bachelor's degree may not give them as many job opportunities as something else," says Linda Gooding, a counselor at the student success center at North Harris College in Houston.

Vocational degrees in demand
That "something else" could be a vocational technical degree or certificate. More than 419,000 Americans with vocational technical degrees landed new jobs in 2001, according to the Employment Policy Foundation.

Health care and information technology are two of the fastest-growing fields that require just two years of training and study after high school. There are job openings for positions from physical therapist assistants to dental hygienists to respiratory therapists just about everywhere. Registered nurses are in particularly high demand.

As for information technology, more than 490,000 new positions for computer support specialists are expected by 2010, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. These jobs can pay as much as $40,000 a year. Desktop publishers, which require vocational certificates, make comparable salaries.

The demand for building construction, electrical and technical workers, skilled craftspeople, welders, machinists and auto technicians also remains strong.

Some college grads fed up with lackluster job prospects head off to a community college or technical school for additional courses and training.

"There are a lot of people who finish up and decide that a community college is the place to learn the skills they need to go out and get a job," says Steve Ackley, director of communications at the Association for Career and Technical Education.

Ready to tear up that bachelor's degree and start over? Not so fast.

The days of almost universal professional employment for college grads may be over, but it's still possible to land a good job straight out of university. Computer software engineers are in huge demand. Accounting majors find jobs in good and bad economic times.

Job opportunities are also on the rise for people with post-baccalaureate degrees. A specialized skill will get you noticed in today's job market. A bachelor's degree may be the first step to the career you want.

"A B.A. is a good solid foundation," says Ron Bird, chief economist at the Employment Policy Foundation. "It's not as much of an end point as it was 20 or 30 years ago. It's more of a starting point."

Fast-growing professions for people with advanced degrees include speech language pathologists and mental health and substance abuse social workers.

Job opportunities and starting salaries are important things to consider when choosing a career. But they shouldn't be the only things. You better like what you do.

Follow your bliss
"It's absolutely the most important thing I preach. You need to find something that's going to fit you, your personality, the best," Gooding says.

It's not a good idea to pursue a career that you may have an aptitude for but don't enjoy.

Why would you want to do something 40 hours a week, 50 weeks a year, that you don't really like? That's 2,000 hours a year spent in job misery. And that doesn't count overtime and all the restless Sunday evenings you'll spend dreading work the next day.

"Nobody is happy 100 percent of the time in their job, but it sure beats being miserable all the time," Gooding says.

Once you settle on a career path, focus on getting the best training you can for the job you want. It could be a two-year college, a four-year college or a technical school.

Whatever school you choose, try to get experience in your field as a student. Participating in a co-op or internship program could lead to a job offer at the completion of your degree. And it could help you find out if the job you think you want is really right for you. The sooner you find this out the better off you'll be.

Gooding once counseled a student who completed an internship in engineering and then promptly switched his major to social work. He could have done well as an engineer, but he just didn't like the work.

"He would have go on and got his engineering degree and been miserable for a few years and then gone back to school," Gooding says.

By switching majors when he did, he spared himself a lot of misery.

-- Posted: May 20, 2002