Obama Proposed Student Loan Repayment Reforms That May Benefit Graduate Students

President Obama has proposed reforms to the federal student loan repayment system with the effect that those with grad school degrees may benefit from lower payments and greater forgiveness. See: http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2014-06-09/grad-students-with-debt-could-win-big-as-obama-slashes-payments

Master Degrees in Analytics and Informatics Are in Very High Demand.

Is there a specific type of grad school degree that is in really high demand? The Chronicle of Education says that people with Master degrees in analytics and informatics are in extremely high demand ( http://chronicle.com/article/As-Data-Proliferate-So-Do/144363/ ). These jobs require a combination of statistical know-how, computer skills, and an analytical mind-set that equips the worker to understand, interpret, and communicate "what all that data means". Much of our economy is now technology and data driven, and as a result people with these type of advanced skills/degrees are needed, but at the same time there is also a high level of demand for places in these analytics and informatics graduate degree programs. People in our economy often have to compete for their jobs with overseas workers who may be willing to work for much less money. Clearly it would benefit America if its workforce can advance its skills into jobs that are relevant to the new more advanced and competitive global economy. Obviously the generation of "big data", and the resulting need to analyze and use the data, is an opportunity to create such advanced jobs in America. One major way for people to get into these jobs is through the avenue of earning an advanced graduate degree in analytics or informatics. Obviously the need for advanced data analysis will not go away, so these types of jobs should continue to be available for a long time. A study, cited in the article from the Chronicle of Higher Education, predicts "a work-force gap of 1.5 million managers and analysts with the skills to decipher and translate data patterns for decision-making". There are such technology degree programs online, and advanced technology degree are listed on my online graduate degree directory website's "Technology degrees" page: http://onlinegraduateschool.tripod.com/tech.htm.

By the way, I do have a BlogSpot photo blog at http://see10.blogspot.com.

Research Show Big Earning Benefits From Earning a Graduate Degree, But The Amount Varies With The Student's Field

Georgetown University research has shown that those who have a graduate degree make substantially much more income on average than those with just a bachelor's degree. Based on the information provided in the report (http://cew.georgetown.edu/whatsitworth/) those with a graduate degrees earn around 40 percent more than those with just the bachelor. However, there was a lot of variation depending on the student's college major.

Those with bachelor degrees in "Health and Medical Preparatory" averaged 190% more earnings when they had a graduate degree, and those with bachelor degrees in "Miscellaneous Social Sciences" averaged 134% more. However, those with bachelor degrees in Psychology/Social Work averaged only 43% more; those in Health, 50%; in Business, 40%; and in Education, 33%. In a few fields, such as Atmospheric Sciences and Meteorology, Studio Arts, and Petroleum Engineering the boost from a graduate degree was very small (in the single digits).

Once you earn a graduate degree it essentially “lasts" for the rest of your career, and you continue to benefit from it for all those years, so, it is very likely to be worth your while to earn the graduate degree money-wise. When you consider the how much you learn, the increase in academic prestige, it is easy to see how earning a graduate degree can really help you.

In a prior post I mentioned that liberal arts majors are particularly likely to benefit from a graduate degree. A study by the Association of American Colleges and Universities found that liberal arts majors make significantly less than professional majors when just out of college, but the liberal arts major’s median salaries are similar to those with the other majors if the liberal arts majors got a graduate degree. The Chronicle of Higher Education article is at http://chronicle.com/article/How-Liberal-Arts-Majors-Fare/144133/ .

I have a similar post on the blog of my website (My website is a direcotry to online graduate degree programs): http://onlinegraduateschool.tripod.com/blog2.htm#geo.

Harvard and MIT Are Making EdX MOOC Data Available for Research

Harvard and MIT are making EdX MOOC data available for research. I think it could be a huge opportunity for some education researchers who are looking for data opportunities. The CHE story on it>http://chroni.cl/1fg2F2v

Competency-based Degree Programs are Ready for a Surge?

I noticed this story at Inside Highered which suggests competency-based degrees may be ready for a surge. >http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/02/21/direct-assessment-and-feds-take-competency-based-education . Competency-based implies that the student can test-out of much or all of the coursework normally required to earn a degree by passing appropriate tests or submitting completed work. Since higher education has become so expensive the demand for competency-based degrees seems to have surged. The validity of a competency-based degree depends on the validity of the methods that are used to assess the students skills and abilities, but isn't the validity of regular degree programs also dependent on that? The Inside Higher Ed story is concerned with the federal governments action in encouraging/discouraging competency-based higher education. Leading proponents of competency-based degrees include Southern New Hampshire University and Western Governors University, and I think you can count Excelsior University as a proponent too. These three institution are regionally accredited. The graduate degree program information presented on my website ( http://onlinegraduateschool.tripod.com/nfp.htm ) is focussed on online degree programs from regionally accredited institutions.

Newly Added to My Website: Online Master Degrees In Healthcare Informatics, Human Resources, Nursing, and Health Science.

Website news… I added information and links for online Master degree programs in Health Science and in Human Resources from a Catholic university in Loretto, Pennsylvania> http://onlinegraduateschool.tripod.com/nfp.htm#stf .

All the graduate degree programs presented on my website ( http://onlinegraduateschool.tripod.com/nfp.htm ) are online degree programs from regionally accredited institutions.

Has Your Website Been ... De-deprecated??

I found out that deprecated HTML on your website could hurt your websites ranking & functionality. See: http://webdesign.about.com/od/htmltags/a/bltags_deprctag.htm I was really surprised at some of the tags that are deprecated, some of which once seemed very critical and advanced, but are now hinging on the obsolete. Turns out CSS (style sheets) are now even more critical to web site design. This identifies deprecated HTML tags: http://www.codehelp.co.uk/html/deprecated.html