Career Development at the College | Survey asks graduates “Where are you now?”

Acacia O'Connor Senior Editor

Most seniors know the feeling: the sense of panic that begins in the fall and worsens as graduation approaches. “What are you going to do next year?” is the question everyone seems to be asking. Although the future may be unclear as students are knee-deep in the process of wading through classified ads, applications, and interviews, statistics from the Career Development Office (CDO) reveal that Vassar students do tend to find their way after graduating.

Each year, the CDO sends out a survey to the current senior class and to the most recently graduated class in order to track where students go after receiving their degrees. Knowing these trends helps the CDO determine where graduates are, what types of jobs they are finding, and how they are finding them.

The Web-based post-graduate study is conducted in the fall, about six months after graduation. The survey is brief, and asks students for basic information about their employment or graduate school enrollment status, their salary, and their current geographic location.

The response rate is typically between 50 and 65 percent, according to CDO Assistant Director Stacey Bingham.

After the surveys are collected, the CDO assesses general trends. It compares the responses of the class after graduation to those compiled in the pre-graduation survey, as well as to the responses of several classes before.

In a recently conducted survey of the Class of 2005, the CDO found that almost 60 percent of alumni/ae were employed full-time. Nearly 15 percent were employed part-time, while almost 20 percent were attending graduate or another type of professional school.

The median salary range for respondents in the Class of 2005 was $30,000-34,999, which is $5,000 higher than the mean salary of the previous two class years. Seventeen percent make less than $20,000, and five percent make more than $50,000. The highest percentage of students surveyed—24 percent—are making between $30,000 and $35,000. Fifteen percent of those surveyed make between $20,000 and $25,000, with fifteen percent also making beween $35,000 and $40,000.

The largest percentage of the Class of 2005 is working in the field of education, while 13 percent were working in business and communications, respectively.

In terms of methods that employed graduates used to obtain their jobs, more than one-third of respondents found their positions through a Web-based service, and 29 percent were assisted by a personal contact. Vassar recruiting programs aided 9.7 percent of graduates in finding jobs, and seven percent were assisted by the CAP alumni/ae database.

The results collected by the CDO from any class year surveys are available upon request.