New survey reveals the top considerations for students enrolling in college for the first time.
Those are some of the key findings of a new survey released Wednesday by the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP), which is part of the Higher Education Research Institute (HERI) at UCLA.
“Incoming students persist in putting a premium on job-related reasons to go to college,” states the CIRP Freshman Survey, formally titled, “The American Freshman: National Norms Fall 2012.”
Specifically, the survey found that when it comes to reasons to attend college, getting a better job rose to an all-time high of 87.9 percent. That’s up from 85.9 percent in 2011.
“In the minds of today’s college students, getting a better job continues to be the most prevalent reason to go to college,” the survey says.
Similarly, more students than ever — 74.6 percent in 2012 versus 71.7 percent in 2011 — cited “to be able to make more money” as a reason to go to college, catapulting this reason to the fourth-highest reason and surpassing “to gain a general education and appreciation of ideas,” which is now at 72.8 percent, according to the survey.
Similarly, 81 percent of incoming students said “being very well-off financially” was a “very important” or “essential” personal goal. This is also an all-time high, rising from the 79.6 percent who said this goal was important in 2011.
