Specifically, engineering diplomas account for 12 of the 15 the top-paying majors. NACE collects its data by surveying 200 college career centers.

Energy is the key. Petroleum engineering was by far highest-paying degree, with an average starting offer of $83,121, thanks to that resource's growing scarcity. Graduates with these degrees generally find work locating oil and gas reservoirs, or in developing ways to bring those resources to the Earth's surface.

"Exploration for new energy sources is high," Koc said. "The oil and gas industry has done relatively well the past year, even though oil prices are off right now."

Other highly-paid engineering majors include chemical engineers, who employ their skills to make everything from plastics to fuel cells and have an average starting offer of $64,902.

Mining engineers start at $64,404 on average, while computer engineers, who have an expertise in both coding and electrical engineering, pocket roughly $61,738 their first year out of school.

Left behind. Of course, not every student with an engineering degree will score a fat paycheck. RIT's Contomanolis noted that "average" graduates are feeling the pinch of fewer job offers. Still, in a tough job market, graduates with technology degrees have an advantage.

"It's a tech-driven world, and demand [for engineers] is only going to grow," said Farnoosh Torabi, employment expert and Quicken blog editor. "You can't say that about many fields, especially in a recession."

Perhaps that's why more and more college students are picking their majors based on a field's earning power, ultimately "choosing a major that pays," Torabi said.

Top non-engineering fields. Only three of the 15 top paying degrees were outside the field of engineering -- but they each still require math skills.

For computer science majors, who specialize in programming and software, the average salary was $61,407. Graduates with degrees in actuarial science took home about $56,320; and jobs for students in construction management paid about $53,199. Each of these fields has paid well throughout the years, Koc said.

What happened to well-rounded? There are far fewer people graduating with math-based majors, compared to their liberal-arts counterparts, which is why they are paid at such a premium. The fields of engineering and computer science each make up about 4% of all college graduates, while social science and history each comprise 16%, Koc noted.

As a result, salaries for graduates who studied fields like social work command tiny paychecks, somewhere in the vicinity of $29,000. English, foreign language and communications majors make about $35,000, Koc said.

"It's a supply and demand issue," he added. "So few grads offer math skills, and those who can are rewarded."

August 04, 2009
By Jeff Greer
via US News

Having trouble getting that first job out of school? Blame your college—and sue it while you're at it. That's what a recent college graduate is doing.

Trina Thompson, a 27-year-old graduate of Monroe College in the Bronx, N.Y., is suing her alma mater for $70,000 in tuition money, the Associated Press reports. Since her graduation with an information technology degree in April, Thompson has not been able to find work. And Thompson says the school hasn't helped in the job-searching process, either.

"They have not tried enough to help me," Thompson wrote in her lawsuit.
Monroe College spokesman Gary Axelbank told the New York Post that the lawsuit is "completely without merit."

"The college prides itself on the excellent career-development support that we provide to each of our students, and this case does not deserve further consideration," Axelbank told the Post.
Searching for a college? Get our America's Best Colleges 2010 complete rankings.

By Seth Godin

Fewer college grads have jobs than at any other time in recent memory—a report by the National Association of Colleges and Employers annual student survey said that 20 percent of 2009 college graduates who applied for a job actually have one. So, what should the unfortunate 80% do?

How about a post-graduate year doing some combination of the following (not just one, how about all):

* Spend twenty hours a week running a project for a non-profit.
* Teach yourself Java, HTML, Flash, PHP and SQL. Not a little, but mastery. [Clarification: I know you can't become a master programmer of all these in a year. I used the word mastery to distinguish it from 'familiarity' which is what you get from one of those Dummies type books. I would hope you could write code that solves problems, works and is reasonably clear, not that you can program well enough to work for Joel Spolsky. Sorry if I ruffled feathers.]
* Volunteer to coach or assistant coach a kids sports team.
* Start, run and grow an online community.
* Give a speech a week to local organizations.
* Write a regular newsletter or blog about an industry you care about.
* Learn a foreign language fluently.
* Write three detailed business plans for projects in the industry you care about.
* Self-publish a book.
* Run a marathon.

Beats law school.

If you wake up every morning at 6, give up TV and treat this list like a job, you'll have no trouble accomplishing everything on it. Everything! When you do, what happens to your job prospects?


http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2009/06/graduate-school-for-unemployed-college-students.html

1. Put yourself on the Clock. 

Schedule your days, keeping an itinerary for weekdays at the very least. Set tasks and errands as appointments instead of just walking through your daily activities.

2. Maintain a Work-Like Environment.

Keep your door closed, especially if your housemates, parents or relatives are very inclusive, imposing or inviting.  Try to do this during business hours at least -- your job is to stay busy and get work for yourself, so this time should definitely be for yourself.

3. Get Ready For Work.

You're going to get work sometime in the future, so you might as well get used to how that will be in the morning. Get up before 8, wash up, and get dressed up like you're going into the office. This is a tip that has also been working like a charm for telecommuters as well.

4. Have your own Office.

Have a separate space, or a room, where you can focus and do your work -- even if it's just job searching, emails, or balancing your checkbook -- its good to have an area where you ONLY work to get your subconscious in the right mode.

5. Work in a Social Environment.

If possible, spend a few hours a day working in public spaces to get used to working with outside and social distractions. Try your local Starbucks, Barnes & Noble, Library, or anyplace that offers free seating.  Unless you plan on doing specific types of freelancing for the rest of your life, odds are high that you'll be working in an environment outside your house.

6. Start Something.

Get in touch with people back home and think of a project that you can work together with friends or acquaintances still there -- whether it's a website, a car, a blog, a machine, a book, or a competition. It's good to keep up the habit of collaboration and teamwork even if you're not employed.  If you're having a hard time finding collaborators, pick an industry, or even a hobby, and set up a blog dedicated to a specific interest you have about it.

7. Use Your Parents.

If you're back at home, exploit the obvious network opportunity: your parents. Meet with their friends, coworkers, neighbors -- you never know who they might know, and the people that they do will probably not only be older, but employed. 

8. Meet Old People.

Don't just go through your parents and family to pursue the older, more employed demographic.  Check out the incredible networking opportunities through neighborhood, religious, nonprofit and political groups as well.  Many of these individuals can be right outside your door or just down the street: retired CEO's, mothers of HR executives, and grandfathers of of start-up founders.

9. Go Beyond Craigslist.

Don't be the Governator in Total Recall and physically pursue opportunities.  Visit your local markets and shops to stay updated with the classifieds section of your city newspapers and magazines -- you can even try writing for them.  Register and follow up with staffing agencies, big and small, in your area -- spend a few minutes to just walk in and check out whats going on, agencies can be just blocks away from your house.

10. Work Out.

If you find that you still have extra time to relax, have fun or idle, get in shape. Not only will it be beneficial to your performance, but it'll keep you goal motivated and results oriented. Plus, you'll be able to use local gyms, clubs, teams and organizations as a fantastic network.

By BOB HERBERT

Here at home, the terrible toll from the worst economic downturn since the Great Depression continues, with no end to the joblessness in sight and no comprehensible plans for fashioning a healthy economy for the years ahead. The government’s finances resemble a Ponzi scheme. If you want to see the epidemic that is really clobbering American families, look past the H1N1 virus to the home foreclosure crisis.

The Times ran a Page A1 article on Monday that said layoffs, foreclosures and other problems associated with the recession had resulted in big increases in the number of runaway children, many of whom were living in dangerous conditions in the streets.

Americans have tended to watch with a remarkable (I think frightening) degree of passivity as crises of all sorts have gripped the country and sent millions of lives into tailspins. Where people once might have deluged their elected representatives with complaints, joined unions, resisted mass firings, confronted their employers with serious demands, marched for social justice and created brand new civic organizations to fight for the things they believed in, the tendency now is to assume that there is little or nothing ordinary individuals can do about the conditions that plague them.

This is so wrong. It is the kind of thinking that would have stopped the civil rights movement in its tracks, that would have kept women in the kitchen or the steno pool, that would have prevented labor unions from forcing open the doors that led to the creation of a vast middle class.

This passivity and sense of helplessness most likely stems from the refusal of so many Americans over the past few decades to acknowledge any sense of personal responsibility for the policies and choices that have led the country into such a dismal state of affairs, and to turn their backs on any real obligation to help others who were struggling.

Those chickens have come home to roost. Being an American has become a spectator sport. Most Americans watch the news the way you’d watch a ballgame, or a long-running television series, believing that they have no more control over important real-life events than a viewer would have over a coach’s strategy or a script for “Law & Order.”

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/27/opinion/27herbert.html?_r=1