Who Will Employ Our Bright Young Students?
Few adversities sicken teachers more than theinability of conscientious students to find rewarding work upon completion of their formal education. Yet, not only are such adversities befalling sizeable numbers of students now, this situation is likely-to continue and even to accelerate during the first half of the next decade. Although job offers to 1976 bachelor's degree graduates were up 11 percent over the previous year (offers to master's and doctorate eraduatea were uo 8 and 14 oercent. resnectively), the C k e g e placement' Council reports tbat'the number of offers still laeeed 15 oercent behind the last eood recruiting year, 1973-7i.-Com&ting for these offers were 9 oercent more eraduates in 1976 than in 1974. Latest projections from the U.S. Department of Labor indicate that aooroximatelv 13 million oersons will eraduate from co1legei;etween now and 1985, and that a t Last one million (nearly 8 percent) of these will remain unemployed or take jobs that do not require a degree. These projections are based on assumptions that current social, technological and scientific trends and the values placed on work, education, income and leisure will continue, and that the economy will gradually recover, reaching full employment (4 percent unemployment) in the mid-1980s. [See, "The Occupational Outlook Handbook, 197677 Edition", published by the Department of Labor.] A greater oversup-plyof college graduates is expected during 1980-85 than during the period between now and 1980. The projected "gap" forthe next three years is roughly 12,500 a year on the average; between 1980 and 1985 it will average 140,000 per year or 700,000 during the five year period. Some figures and projections on the employment of chemists are of interest. Aonroximatelv 135.000 oersons worked as chemists in 1974. i'bmpare thi; with'l70,d00 civil engineers, 2,500 oceanographers. 190,000 life scientists, 48,000 physicists and 7,200 fond scientists. Nearly three-fourths of all chemists work in orivate industrv. .. nearlv one-half are in the chemicals manu&cturing industry. ~ o sothers i work for companies manufacturing food, scientific instruments, petroleum, paper and electrical equipment. Smaller numbers work for nonorofit research oreanizations and for federal. state and local &ernments, in areas of defense, health, envinnment, and agriculture. Abut 25.000 rhemists are employed in colleges and universities. Several times this number teach chemistry in secondary schools. Mnst of these teachers are classified as educators rather than as chemists in the Labor Department statistics. A rough [sic] balance between supply and demand is pn)iected for chemistsat all degree levels through the mid-1980s. is expected to grow faster than the ~ m ~ l o ~ mofe chemists nt averare for all occupations during this period. Thousands of new jobs will be created and several thousand vacancies will result each year due to retirements, deaths and transfers. Expansion of opportunities for chemists in areas of energy shortages, pollution and toxic chemicals control and health rare in industry and gwernment is prnjected. Just how rough the projected balance betweensupply and demand of chemists and other orofessionals is likelv to be is seen in nn analysis of job opportunities for new PhDs. Based on U.S. Office of Education projections of earned doctorates in all fields and assuming continuation of present ~
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Ieditorially speaking
trends in use of PhDs, the expectation is that by 1985 the number of I'hDs will be more thandouhle the number of jobs traditionally available to Ph1)s. Forchemistry, thesupply of new doctorates between 1972 and 1985 isex~ectedLO beabout 25,800, while the openings for PhDs will'be about 19,600, giving a surplus of about 6,200 or roughly 24%. In areas such as life sciences, psychology and education the surpluses are expected to be much greater. Some supply~demandratios in thousands of PhDs o\,er the 1972-85 period are: life sciences, 92.2 26.0; psychology, 37.7115.0; education, 118.8,28.9; engineerine. 50.31333 ~ h e ~ i m p l i c a t i o nofs the projected imbalances between supply and demand of colleee eraduates a t all deeree levels shb&d be of serious and immeiiate concern to aliin higher education. If the proiections are correct, one in ten of todav's freshmen, and one in three of e n t e r i n g ~ hcandidates ~ wko survive and graduate will he unable to find a job commensurate with his or her education and training. Unless there is a major ~.upturn of events the proiections are likely to prove far more optimistic than reliable: Also, since che&s&y is described as having one of the more favorable supplyldemand ratios, student interest in this area might increase with predictable consequences. If we are willing to accept today what all indicators tell us we shall have to live with by 1980 and beyond, namely, far more nersons with colleee deerees than rewardine" iobs available tb them, then pergaps we should reflect on three questions: What is the responsibility of the average faculty member and the individual college or university in preparing for this eventuality? How do we as faculty members and teachers, and how do our institutions deal fairly with students who will be comnetine What can or . .. for far more limited oooortunities? .. should we do to help solve, ameliorateoracrommodate to the problem of critical surpluses of college educated persons? Two widely divergent thoughts come ten mind in attempting tneraso theenormitv of the imolirations in all this. The first is:Perhaps now is the time to discover if indeed the American will and character are strong and generous enough to bring about a major cultural modification, one that would amend the dream of success as measured in earnines and status to encompass as a full measureof success the dedicated pursuit of the wmmon good in whate\,er role the indi\,idual may be called upon to play. The idea is not new; religions have espoused it ior thousands of years; champions of the liberal a n s have descrihed it as the essence of a liberal arts education; millions of kind, enobled souls of every maior rivilization have accepted it as a moral utrligation. Yet it hadnever really caught on in America. The serond thought IS: Are the young people sitting in our classes reads, or can we prepare them to lead or even to survive such a cultural revolution? The second thought is: Are the young people sitting in our classes ready, or can we prepare them to leador even tosurvive such a cultural revolution? We have before us a group of ewer young people conditioned to think they are heaied f(,r aspnrls extravaganzn when the only game in town is cotwn-picking. The oruhlem with cotton-oickine is that it offers little chance to be anything more than a cotton-picker-or a revolutionary. 9
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WTL Volume 53, Number 11, November 1976 / 671
