Early Recruiting Expectations

The following was reported on Wednesday, August 15 in the National Association for Colleges and Employers (NACE) online newsletter Spotlight. This is excellent information for 2008 college graduates.

2007 Salary Survey Participant Survey: An Early Preview of Recruiting Expectations for the Class of 2008

A brief look back at the 2006-07 college recruiting season shows that college graduates encountered a very positive job market this past year. NACE's recently completed survey of college career centers that participated in the NACE 2006-07 Salary Survey confirms what previous NACE surveys—2006-07 Job Outlook, 2006-07 Salary Survey, and 2007 Graduating Student Survey—found:

• Employers were more active on college campuses than in the previous year (56 percent of respondents indicated higher levels of activity compared with only 12 percent that found activity lower);


• Students had more opportunities to choose from than in the previous year (78 percent indicated more opportunities, while only eight percent thought there were fewer opportunities for graduates);


• and Students reported a very positive perspective on the job market they were encountering to their college career centers (66 percent of respondents described student perspectives on the job market as positive compared with only four percent who found them negative).

Although the job market for college graduates was relatively positive for students across the board, there were three industries that stood out to our college career center respondents as particularly strong. They were accounting, engineering, and information technology.
As for the coming year, the feeling among college career centers is that 2007-08 will likely be as good, if not better, than last year for their graduates. Fifty-three percent of respondents expect recruiting to be heavier in the Fall of 2007 than it was in the Fall of 2006, and only two percent are anticipating a decline.

The positive perspective is fairly uniform across the country, but appears to be particularly positive in the Northeast (70 percent see a heavier recruiting season) and the West (56 percent anticipate an increase) with the South and Midwest being somewhat less enthusiastic about expectations for the fall.

In addition to the overall positive job market, respondents identified several factors that suggest that the fall may find a fairly intense recruiting season, such as:

• Last year, students tended to receive multiple job offers. NACE's 2007 Graduating Student Survey found that graduates active in the job market received an average of 2.4 job offers; Students received these offers earlier in the academic year last year than they had in previous years;


• an There was considerable pressure from employers on the students to accept an offer earlier in the year last year when compared to previous years. As a result, nearly 53 percent of graduates who had applied for a job had one waiting for them months before they graduated, according to NACE's 2007 Graduating Student Survey.

For more information on NACE and additional career and professional development information see their website at www.naceweb.org .

Let us know what you think!

kwells@howard.edu

Kim R. Wells