When Your Son/Daughter Says I Want To Be an Engineer, Clap Your Hands

April 23rd, 2011

The best-paying college major is engineering
Engineering majors continue to boast fatter salary offers than their peers, according to the most recent survey from the National Association of Colleges and Employers. Majors in the engineering field dominated the association’s list of top-paying degrees for the class of 2011, with four of the top five spots going to engineering majors. Each of these majors receives average starting salary offers of more than $60,000.

Exception
The only non-engineering major among the top five was computer science, which earned graduating students average starting salary offers of $63,017. “The entire top-10 list underscores the interest employers have in hiring technical majors,” said Marilyn Mackes, NACE executive director. And the interest in these majors isn’t new. Engineering majors in last year’s graduating class were also promised the most attractive salaries.

Which engineering?
Chemical engineers were offered the highest starting salaries this year, an average of $66,886. Mechanical engineers received salary offers averaging $60,739, and electrical and communications engineering majors saw average offers of $60,646. Computer engineering was the fifth highest-paying major, with offers averaging $60,112. Rounding out the top ten best-paying majors were industrial engineering, systems engineering, engineering technology, information sciences and systems, and business systems networking or telecommunications.

Non-engineering degrees
Even non-engineering majors are seeing more attractive offers this year, NACE reported in February. While not quite the $60,000-plus offers that engineers are getting, the average starting salary across all majors is $50,034, up 3.5% from last year.

Liberal arts majors
While the association’s survey didn’t break out starting salaries for individual liberal arts majors, offers were up a whopping 9.5% to $35,633 for the group as a whole. That compares to a steep drop of 11% last year.

I am an engineer
I am a retired professional engineer. Besides always earning a good salary, I have never been a day without work in a very long engineering career. In times like the present, being employed is probably more important than the amount one earns and my profession has never let me down.

The ancients
Engineering as a profession or trade is very old, dating back to the beginnings of civilization. The Pharos of Alexandria, the pyramids in Egypt, the Hanging Gardens of Babylon, the Acropolis and the Parthenon in Greece, the Roman aqueducts, Via Appia and the Colosseum, Teotihuacán and the cities and pyramids of the Mayan, Inca and Aztec Empires, the Great Wall of China, among many others, stand as a testament to the ingenuity and skill of the ancient civil and military engineers.

The very beginning
The earliest civil engineer known by name is Imhotep. As one of the officials of the Pharaoh, Djosèr, he probably designed and supervised the construction of the Pyramid of Djoser, known as the Step Pyramid, at Saqqara in Egypt around 2630-2611 BC. He may also have been responsible for the first known use of columns in architecture.

Allow it
If one of your children wants to be an engineer, don’t stand in the way.

This entry was posted on Saturday, April 23rd, 2011 at 7:32 am and is filed under Economy, Employment, Finance, Personal / Internet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.

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