It’s a revealing chart, though some of the liberal arts types might not understand it.
12 thoughts on “Engineering And English Majors”
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It’s a revealing chart, though some of the liberal arts types might not understand it.
Comments are closed.
It seems to reveal what we already knew, at least the default view there.
People who get STEM degrees tend to get associated jobs.
(I expect the interactive version to be more interesting, if it ever finishes loading.
And I am, as usual, the exception that proves the rule; a Philosophy major who never contemplated any job other than programming, and has been doing just that ever since graduation.
That said, of course, taking the first two years of a CS program sure didn’t hurt.)
I’m a Liberal Arts Major (major: History; minor: English) who is a bit of a dinosaur because I went to college at a time when they the purpose of going to college was to get educated, not train for a career. Now the college just seems to be Yuppie Kindergarten. Way back when, Albert Jay Nock distinguished been the “Educated” (more or less synonymous with what later would be called “Culturally Literate”) and the “Sagacious” (meaning, not Yoda, but knowledgeable about the ways of society, what society wants and how to give it to them.” Nock said, “All things being equal, the Educated will invariable wind up chopping wood and carrying water for the Sagacious.” From my own experience I would say, “Sad but true”–although I find it inspiring that Nock, who was one of the Educated if anyone ever was, avoided chopping wood or carrying water for, say, George Babbitt. Of course, we call can’t be successful–to the extent of being self-sufficient–editors and writers. I wish.
I read “Culturally Literate” as meaning “fun at cocktail parties.” Doesn’t seem like something worth paying tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars and a good chunk of your youth for, but whatever gets ya out of the house I guess.
Trent, you may be of the new generation of college students, so reading books (other than books related to advancing one’s career) may not be your things, but there’s more to cultural literacy than being fun at cocktails. (Which–until clothes start coming off, I am not: at parties I tend to go off by myself and scope out the host’s library.) See:
http://www.amazon.com/Cultural-Literacy-Every-American-Needs/dp/0394758439
I haven’t had time to dig into the full report, but this stood out.
[[[And only about 26% of physical-sciences majors work in any STEM occupation at all;]]]
This would imply that we are producing four times the market demand. So what about the great STEM labor shortage?
As a physics major working in the service sector, I can tell you that unless you have exactly what the market wants, there are no jobs available.
There is this interesting IEEE Spectrum article that discusses the STEM myth.
Matula, I agree with your reading. In addition, the chart shows half engineering degrees don’t go into engineering. This is the census bureau providing this graph, so where is this STEM labor shortage?
Just anecdotally within my little niche of the IT industry (working for one of the large research hospitals): I see dozens of job openings advertised each month. Every single one has requirements listed that seem completely absurd if they actually want the job filled: At least five years experience doing [abstruse technical product], expert at [abstruse technical product] and [ ] and [ ], etc., on and on. Every one looks daunting to me with decades of work experience in the field, but not in exactly what’s required.
As for actually finding jobs, pretty much everyone I know who found one, actually got it through word of mouth.
There’s a recurring pattern of job requirements that are either completely unrealistic (entry level position requiring 10 years of experience on products/languages/ststems that are only 3 years old) or resumes tailored to a specific person. I see the second type a lot.
I sometimes wonder if these job ads are written that way to attract the kind of people who will apply anyway. Seems like a good way to attract talent that feel they can learn anything and get the job done. If so, I imagine the secret sauce is to use the interview to determine if they’re just trying to bluff their way through.
That’s all well and good until there’s some sort of computer filter looking for key words stopping resumes from getting through because certain key words are missing. The same thing could apply to HR personnel ignorant of the actual need screening as well.
I sorta work in my field and I am a Science Major. My degree is useful from time to time. Technical writing is used more than any other college-derived skill.