With a slumping economy and the hope of better job prospects, college graduates are heading back to the books.
Graduate school applications rose 8.3 percent from 2008 to 2009, according to the Council of Graduate Schools. The largest jump in applications was for degrees in business and health sciences.
In order to stay competitive in a growing marketplace, AU is continuing to update existing programs and add new options for graduate students. In the past three years alone, the School of Communication, the Kogod School of Business and the School of International Service have added more than six separate graduate programs.
“We’re looking at weekend professional programs, where we’ll have pockets of innovative programs and curriculum that fit the competing demands of today’s graduate students,” Vice Provost for Graduate Studies Jonathan Tubman said. “We want to prepare a well- rounded graduate student that has both professional skills and the services of a supportive academic system.”
Tubman said AU is looking at more hybrid models of learning and offering class times that coincide with the schedules of working professors.
“By adding in online courses, plus face-to-face classes, we want to make it easier in the future for graduate students to finish their degrees,” he said.
One program unique to AU is the new Master of Science in Sustainability Management, offered through Kogod. Sustainability management focuses on the need to provide solutions to many environmental and societal issues that continue to arise both at home and abroad.
“We believe that there is both an immediate need and demand for this type of interdisciplinary program, and that we are the first business school in the country to offer a MSSM degree,” Program Director Daniel Jacobs said. “It is particularly appropriate for business schools to offer such programs because business has an increasingly prominent role and responsibility in addressing sustainability issues.”
Jacobs said he hopes the effects of the program will be felt both on campus and off.
“I hope that the program’s influence will be felt not only at AU, but in a variety of fields in the private and public sectors, including sustainability strategy, regulatory compliance, environmental protection, natural resource conservation, global development and corporate social responsibility,” he said.
A screenwriter by trade, second-year SIS graduate student Aron Flasher knew he wanted a career change. But returning to school means learning how to use Blackboard, properly cite papers, build resumes and navigate professional journals.
“I wish the [international relations] program would have required brief seminars for students, like myself, who had been out of school for a while and/or were coming from a totally unique major, also like me,” Flasher said. “Anything that would have smoothed the transition process and filled in the gaps between international relations students and the rest of us,” he continued.
But many students said as they plan their next steps after graduate school, the time they spend at AU seems worthwhile.
“I’ve wanted this since I was 15,” said Elizabeth Schaub, a second-year graduate student in SOC. “I knew back in 2000 that someday, somehow, I’d be at AU. It’s worth the 10 years it took and the money it cost. The professors are amazing, and I’ve become much more confident with the abilities I gained in my undergraduate education with the skills I’ve picked up in graduate school.”
