Potential Carl - concerned about future jobs?

Colleges and Universities A-Z Carleton College
1

After lots of thinking and comparison, I thought that a liberal arts degree would be my type of education to pursue as opposed to a larger university.

I visited Carleton – I absolutely fell in love with it! Truly, the people were incredible, the atmosphere was serene and welcoming – I’m just worried about one thing.

Am I being totally unreasonable attending a liberal arts college if I want a decent job out of college? For all of your current Carls – I’m all about pursuing the majors you love, but it would be nice to not have to attend grad. school. Are my expectations for finding a well-paying job in, say, finance/economics? Or perhaps math/science…

Any comfort for Carleton would be great. I appreciate realistic views, but I’m very excited about the possibility of attending Carleton.

2

You have nothing to worry about.

Despite a seemingly large numbers of Carls heading to non-profits (Peace Corps and beyond) or grad school, the LARGEST group of graduates is much more traditional than you’d guess - “Business, finance and sales,” ~ 21%.

Carleton’s mid-career earnings are as high/higher than all the regional top university players (Northwestern, Chicago, Wash U) and even high-cost East Coasters (Columbia, Yale, Hopkins).

This was posted in another thread, recently published by The Brookings Institution. Carleton fared very, very well:

RANK INSTITUTION SALARY VALUE-ADDED PREDICTED MID-CAREER SALARY ACTUAL MID-CAREER SALARY*

  1. California Institute of Technology 49% $77,129 $126,200
  2. Colgate University 46% $79,774 $126,600
  3. Massachusetts Institute of Technology 45% $82,439 $128,800
  4. Rose-Hulman Institute of Technology 44% $73,628 $114,100
  5. Carleton College 43% $76,236 $117,700
  6. Washington and Lee University 42% $81,281 $124,300
  7. SUNY Maritime College 42% $79,637 $121,700
  8. Clarkson University 42% $72,583 $110,700
  9. Manhattan College 42% $72,701 $110,800
  10. Stanford University 41% $83,864 $126,400
3

My daughter graduated from Carleton with a double major in math and economics. She has a good job. Most of her friends got jobs right out of college, too. (Majors: math; computer science; physics; English.)

4

A Carl who was an IT security architect used to sit next to me at work. He majored in Japanese & CS, taught in Japan for a few years, then moved back home to work in a job related to CS. He loved his Carleton experience, would not trade it.

5

I know a Carleton senior (son of an old friend) econ major who already has a job offer from a major corporation. If the fit is right, go for it.

6

My son graduated Carleton last June & had a job lined up in January already (he was a math major). A number of his friends in different fields had jobs lined up before they graduated (not all, but many).