Why STEM needs a community to succeed

University of Maryland Baltimore-County president, students discuss STEM at U.S. News conference

stem-conference-educationWashington, DC — When journalist Judy Woodruff was in college, she wanted to be a mathematician, but a professor discouraged her from pursuing math as a career.

“He thought women had no place in advanced mathematics,” Woodruff recalled during the opening keynote of U.S. News and World Report‘s STEM SOLUTIONS conference Wednesday.

She instead studied political science, a move that worked in her favor, leading her to one day co-anchor PBS Newshour. But the sting of his dismissal remains, and she wonders how many other young women have been told the same thing.…Read More

Colleges fight to retain interest of STEM majors

Experts estimate that less than 40 percent of students who enter college as STEM majors actually wind up earning a degree in science, technology, engineering or math, U.S. News reports. Those who don’t make it to the finish line typically change course early on. Just ask Mallory Hytes Hagan, better known as Miss America 2013. Hagan enrolled at Auburn University as a biomedical science major, but transferred to the Fashion Institute of Technology a year later to pursue a career in cosmetics and fragrance marketing.

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Which universities are ranked highest by college officials?

Have you ever wondered which universities have the best reputations among college officials? To answer that question, U.S. News is publishing the reputation rankings for schools in the National Universities rankings category that placed highest in terms of undergraduate academic reputation in our Best Colleges 2013 rankings. Reputation is very important to prospective students. In a survey of freshmen by the University of California–Los Angeles, students rated whether a college has a good academic reputation as the No. 1 factor that influenced their school choice, indicating their firm belief that reputation matters to a significant degree. These results also support a key premise in the U.S. News Best Colleges rankings methodology, which gives undergraduate academic reputation a weight of 15 percent in our National Universities and National Liberal Arts Colleges ranking categories…

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10 most expensive private colleges and universities

Economic uncertainty is influencing the colleges prospective students choose to attend, according to an annual report by the University of California–Los Angeles, which surveyed more than 190,000 first-time, full-time students, U.S. News reports. Nearly 68 percent of these students said the ability to finance their education was a concern, and close to 10 percent passed on a first-choice school in favor of a less expensive option, the report states. Students may find the sticker price of a private education difficult to swallow, especially at elite institutions such as Columbia University and Vassar College, both in New York. Each school landed among the top 10 in their respective categories in the 2013 Best Colleges rankings, but they also hold court as the two most expensive private schools in the country. Tuition and fees at Columbia totaled $47,426 for the 2012-2013 school year…

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Politicians, business leaders ask high schoolers to consider community college

Four-year colleges are often seen as the natural next step for high school students, but business leaders and politicians want teens to consider another option: community college, U.S. News reports. An associate degree from a two-year technical program may be the quickest route for recent high school graduates to enter a stable, lucrative career field. It may also be the only way to keep up with workforce demands, said President Obama.

“Jobs requiring at least an associate degree are projected to grow twice as fast as jobs requiring no college experience,” the president said at a 2010 summit of community college leaders. “We will not fill those jobs–or keep those jobs on our shores–without the training offered by community colleges.”

An estimated 600,000 jobs, largely in manufacturing, currently sit unfilled because of a lack of qualified workers, Jay Timmons, president and CEO of the National Association of Manufacturers, noted last week in written testimony to the House Committee on Education and the Workforce……Read More

Decline in endowments may affect best colleges rankings

The value of college endowments, which had rebounded following the recession, declined slightly despite a recovering stock market, U.S. News reports. This finding comes from the newly released 2012 NACUBO-Commonfund Study of Endowments, produced by the National Association of College and University Business Officers. It turns out that 2012 was a sub-par year for the performance of college endowments. According to the study, the endowments of the 831 institutions surveyed had an average decline of 0.3 percent in the year ending June 30, 2012. This is down sharply from the previous year’s average gain of 19.2 percent and well below 2010’s gain of 11.9 percent, but better than the 18.7 percent decline for endowments that occurred during the recession in 2009. In terms of the methodology used to calculate the U.S. News Best Colleges rankings, the absolute size and annual performance of a college’s endowment are not direct factors in the rankings…

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Low-skill jobs with the highest concentration of college graduates

The Center for College Affordability and Productivity released a study last week confirming what many recent college graduates have known for a long time: a large proportion of grads are working in jobs that don’t require a college degree, U.S. News reports. What we didn’t know was the situation may have been worse than we realized. According to the study, nearly half of college graduates are working jobs that require less than a four-year degree.So what low-skill job are you likely to find should you call the wrong side of the coin? Retail Sales/Clerk. Either handling cash became more complicated over the last forty years, or a large portion of the retail labor force is over-educated. Nearly 25 percent of shelf stockers, cash register jockeys, and clothing folders hold a four-year degree…

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Freshmen students say rankings aren’t key factor in college choice

Once more, the largest and longest running survey of new U.S. college students refutes the often-stated belief by many in higher education that the U.S. News Best Colleges rankings are the primary factor in the average student’s choice of college. That conclusion comes from the University of California–Los Angeles‘s just-released survey, “The American Freshman: National Norms Fall 2012.” This year’s data is based on the responses of 192,912 first-year students at 238 U.S. four-year colleges and universities who entered college in fall 2012. The highly regarded annual survey asks new freshmen to rate which factors were “very important” in influencing their decision to attend a particular college. Incoming fall 2012 freshmen could choose as many of the 23 reasons listed as they wanted…

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10 least expensive private colleges and universities

Private colleges often come with hefty price tags, which can be an automatic turnoff for prospective students, U.S. News reports. Close to 43 percent of incoming freshmen said they “carefully considered” cost when choosing which school to attend, according to an annual survey of more than 190,000 first-time, full-time students by the University of California–Los Angeles. For price-conscious students, the cost of private school can be difficult to reconcile against their less expensive public counterparts. Average private school tuition for the 2012-2013 school year was $28,946, compared with $8,176 (in-state) and $18,855 (out-of-state) at public institutions, according to data reported by 1,088 ranked public and private universities in an annual survey by U.S. News

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National Liberal Arts colleges where most accepted students enroll

Though prospective college students are increasingly applying to more schools, each applicant can ultimately enroll in just one. For fall 2011, some of the most popular choices among students were U.S. service academies, U.S. News reports. Colleges refer to the percentage of their accepted first year students who choose to enroll as “yield” and report the statistic to U.S. News in annual surveys. Yield is an important indicator of what students think about their college choice. While a high yield shows students greatly value being admitted to a particular institution, a low yield may mean that the school was considered a “safety” and may not have been those students’ first choice. In a 2012 U.S. News survey, 233 ranked National Liberal Arts Colleges, generally small schools that emphasize undergraduate education, reported yield rates for fall 2011…

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