Date of Award

5-1978

Degree Type

Report

Degree Name

Master of Science (MS)

Department

Education

Committee Chair(s)

William A. Stull

Committee

William A. Stull

Abstract

"While a 1973 English major tends bar in a local nightspot, a social work graduate labors in a steel mill. A math major washes dishes in Florida, an education graduate works as a bank teller and a psychology major serves cocktails in Maine." (Jolly & Pierce, 1976, p . 2) . As these examples point out, there is a great need for our institutions of higher learning to be more responsive to the needs of the job market today.

For the past several years, colleges and universities have been criticized on the basis that they do not prepare young people to assume their future role in business, industry, and government. The tightening job market in the 1970's has spotlighted the problem facing many college graduates-- What does one do after college? By 1975 the hiring of all college graduates was off by more than 60 percent from 1963, and off by more than 80 percent for those in liberal arts. About two-thirds of our college students in the United States are majors in the humanities, social sciences, and other liberal arts. And a recent survey by the College Placement Council revealed that most employers filled less than 10 percent of their new college hires from the ranks of liberal arts graduates. (Hyink, 1963, p. 6)

Many of our colleges and universities have already recognized these problems and have responded by changing and revising their programs. Cooperative education is one of the programs they are using and it is showing dramatic results. During the past ten years in the Seattle, Washington a r ea a cooperative education program called Seattle/ POC has placed into employment more than 4,000 Seattle area residents. These graduates have added 18 million dollars annually to the economy of the area (Jolly & Pierce, 1976, p. 1).

Cooperative education has proven itself as a program that can prepare individuals for the job market today . It is very important that we have well-trained personnel to administer these programs. We do not know much about the duties and responsibilities of the coordinator; if we did we could better train these coordinators for their very important assignments.

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