Name:Class:"Diploma-12"by Dominican University is licensed under CC BY-NC-ND 2.0Will the 'right' college major get you a job?By Glenn Altschuler2015A common question that most students in college, or preparing to apply for college, get is ‘what do you wantto major in?’ But how much does your major in college truly matter? In this informational text, GlennAltschuler discusses how important the major you choose in college is to your success after college. As youread, take notes on what drives people to choose certain majors in college.A college education provides lots of benefits.Those benefits include acquiring skills, identifyinginterests, learning about others across time andspace, and establishing personal and professionalconnections.Abundant evidence exists that college graduatesare more mature and self-confident, bettercitizens, healthier, wealthier and happier thanindividuals who do not have an undergraduatedegree.As the cost of attendance has skyrocketed,however, students and their parents are focusingmore and more on short-term considerations. Does college constitute a sound financial investment?Will a graduate get a good job with a high salary?College myths and misconceptionsInWill College Pay Off?, Peter Cappelli, a professor of management and director of the Center forHuman Resources at the Wharton School at the University of Pennsylvania, draws on existing data onemployment and higher education in the United States to provide some surprising and provocativeanswers to these questions.In the process, he busts pervasive1myths and misconceptions.Cappelli acknowledges that the average college graduate now earns considerably more than a personwith a high school degree and that the gap between them is growing.He points out, however, that the “college wage premium,” the difference between the annual andlifetime earnings of college graduates and those who do not have an undergraduate degree, has beenvolatile2in the United States over time. As recently as the 1960s and the ‘70s, no gap existed. Thecurrent gap is higher for workers who have been out of college longer.[1][5]1.Pervasive(adjective):spreading widely throughout an area or group of people2.Volatile(adjective):able to change rapidly and unpredictably, especialy for the worse1
