Mega-Trends Over 50 Years

In fall 1956, women accounted for just 34.5 percent of all enrollments in institutions of higher education; in 2004, they accounted for 57.2 percent. This trend has been steady over the years, indicating that women will continue to account for a larger and larger portion of enrollments. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1: Total Enrollment, by Gender, Selected Year, 1956-2004

Year	Total Enrollment	Male	Female
1956	2,918,212	1,911,458 (65.5%)	1,006,754 (34.5%)
1966	6,389,872	3,856,216 (60.3%)	2,533,656 (39.7%)
1976	11,012,137	5,810,828 (52.8%)	5,201,309 (47.2%)
1986	12,503,511	5,884,515 (47.1%)	6,618,996 (52.9%)
1996	14,367,520	6,352,825 (44.2%)	8,014,695 (55.8%)
2004	17,272,044	7,387,262 (42.8%)	9,884,782 (57.2%)
Source: National Center for Education Statistics, 2005 Digest of Education Statistics (2006), Table 170.

Besides accounting for a larger share of enrollments, women are also earning a bigger share of the degrees. In 1960, men earned nearly two-thirds of bachelor’s degrees, and more than twothirds of degrees at the master’s level. In comparison, in 2004, women accounted for nearly three out of five bachelor’s degrees and master’s degrees. (See Figure 2.)

They are also earning a bigger portion of some of degrees in many of the key disciplines: For example, men account for nearly 91 percent of the bachelor’s degrees granted in business in 1956, while women earned less than 10 percent of those degrees. In 2004, women outstripped men in business degrees, earning 50.3 percent of those granted at the bachelor’s level. At the master’s level, the changes were equally dramatic: Women earned less than 5 percent of master’s level business degrees in 1956; in 2004, they earned 42 percent. (See Figure 3.)

Similarly, women have made significant inroads into engineering—earning less than 1 percent of bachelor’s degrees in engineering in 1960, and nearly 19 percent by 2004—and computer/ information sciences.

Figure 2: Degrees Conferred 1960 and 2004, by Gender

Degree	Total Conferred	Male	Female
Year: 1960
Associate Degrees	n/a
Bachelor’s Degrees	392,440	254,063 (64.7%)	138,377 (35.3%)
Master’s Degrees	74,435	50,898 (68.8%)	23,537 (31.6%)
Year: 2004
Associate Degrees	665,301	260,033 (39.1%)	405,268 (60.9%)
Bachelor’s Degrees	1,399,542	595,425 (42.5%)	804,117 (57.5%)
Master’s Degrees	558,940	229,545 (41.1%)	329,395 (58.9%)
* Earliest data available for associate degree candidates is 1966. A total of 111,607 associate degrees were conferred of which 63,779 (57.1 percent) were earned by men and 47,828 (42.9 percent) were earned by women. Source: National Center for Education Statistics, 2005 Digest of Education Statistics (2006), Table 246.

The candidate pool has also changed in terms of its racial/ethnic make up. At the associate, bachelor’s, and master’s degree levels, the shift is toward candidates from diverse ethnic/racial backgrounds. Racial/ ethnic minorities account for a larger portion of degrees conferred. (See Figure 4.)

While employers can expect racial/ ethnic minorities to account for a larger piece of the degree pie, it’s important for organizations to align their diversity hiring goals with actual supply of candidates. Figure 5 indicates, for example, that black candidates accounted for approximately 5.4 percent of the engineering degrees conferred at the bachelor’s level in 2004—and that covers all engineering disciplines.

Employers also can expect the trend toward a more diverse labor force to continue. (See Figures 6 and 7.) White workers accounted for 81.6 percent of those entering the civilian labor force over 1994-2004, but are expected to account for less than three-quarters over the 2004-2014 period. Note that workers of Hispanic origin will account for a smaller percentage of those entering the work force in the 2004-2014 period than was the case in 1994-2004; however, these workers are projected to account for 15.9 percent of the civilian labor force as a whole (not just those entering) by 2014, up from 9.1 percent in 1994.

The types of degrees that students earn has also changed over the years: Most notably, a larger portion of students are opting for degrees in the business disciplines at both the bachelor’s and master’s degree levels. (See Figure 8.) Not surprisingly, as opportunities (and salaries) have grown over the years, computer and information sciences degrees and degrees in health and related clinical sciences now account for a significantly larger portion of degrees conferred.

Conversely, other fields have lost significant ground. For example, education degrees now account for less than 10 percent of bachelor’s degrees conferred, while 35 years ago, they accounted for more than one in five degrees earned.

Other fields have remained relatively stable in terms of portion of degrees conferred. Biological and life sciences, for example, account for nearly the same percentage degrees conferred in 1971 and 2004—4.3 percent and 4.4 percent respectively.

Demographics are important both to effective college recruiting efforts and to effective career services programming, as they enable professionals to model their programs to a portrait of the candidate/ student. Reviewing demographics through the lens of the past half century suggests what professionals can reasonably expect in coming years: 1) a college candidate pool that is increasingly female and diverse; and 2) shifts in types of degrees students will pursue.

Both require employers and career services professionals to step back and review their programs and processes, but shifts in degrees poses special challenges. For career services offices, aside from developing programs to meet new student interests and needs, the challenge is to provide employers with information about the supply of candidates on their campuses and to help employers access those candidates, especially those in short supply fields. For employers focused on candidates that fall into less popular disciplines, the immediate challenge is to access that limited supply, but a longterm challenge may be to ensure that there is a supply of candidates in those fields. Although salary is often the incentive used to gain interest, it’s not always effective. Moreover, NACE’s student attitude studies indicate that enjoying the work—not earning a high salary—is the most popular motivation for selecting a field. Consequently, employers in unpopular fields may have to market the career as well as their organization— a tall order.