Their future is looking bright

Andrew Edwards

This year’s crop of graduates from UC Irvine’s Paul Merage School of

Business appear to have much better job prospects than those of

recent classes, the director of the school’s career center says.

It’s an employment outlook that mirrors that of business schools

nationwide, according to the results of a recent survey.

“Things are definitely looking up compared to a few years ago,

when job prospects were pretty abysmal,” UC Irvine MBA Career Center

director Randy Williams said.

Commencement ceremonies for students earning master’s degrees in

business administration at UC Irvine are scheduled for June 19.

Preliminary figures suggest the job market for graduating business

students has risen substantially over recent years.

This academic year, companies have made 1,089 online job postings

for UC Irvine students, Williams said. Last year, there were 766

postings, up from 491 postings the year before.

The amount of companies looking to hire UC Irvine students has

also increased, Williams said. So far this year, 714 firms have

visited the business school’s website, which allows companies to post

job openings, look at students’ resumes or check the school’s

recruitment schedule.

The amount of businesses visiting the website this year is more

than double last year’s figure of 336 companies, and more than four

times the 164 companies that checked out the school’s website two

years ago.

Numbers for this year, Williams said, are preliminary because

students have not yet graduated.

Williams conducted the MBA Career Services Council’s 2005

Employment Survey, which compiled responses from 71 business schools.

The MBA Career Services Council is an association for people with

jobs in the MBA career services field.

The survey reported people at business schools across the country

saw an improvement in their students’ job prospects.

Almost every business school surveyed reported an increase in job

recruiting over last year.

Only one school surveyed reported seeing a decline in job

recruiting activity, and four schools responded that recruiting

efforts stayed level.

Consulting, finance and sales and marketing were the three types

of jobs where recruiting increased most significantly, according to

the survey. President Mindy Storrie of the MBA Career Services

Council interpreted the numbers as showing an improvement in job

opportunities across various economic sectors.

Though Storrie did not have access to archived survey results

available when interviewed, she said business school graduates’ job

prospects are the best they have been since 2001, the year the 1990s

boom came to an end.

“You can imagine how much more exciting it is to be in this

industry,” Storrie said. “It’s a great feeling after three years of

challenges.”

Vanguard University in Costa Mesa is still building its MBA

program, which is set to launch this fall. The university has

undergraduate business majors and Rosanne Freilich, Vanguard’s

director of career services, said she has observed an increase in job

recruiting, though she did not have statistics available.

Freilich pointed to another recent report that suggested this

year’s graduates should have a brighter outlook than those who left

school last year.

In May, the National Assn. of Colleges and Employers released

results from a national survey of employers that indicated college

hiring could increase 13.9% above last year’s levels in the West.

* ANDREW EDWARDS covers business and the environment. He can be

reached at (714) 966-4624 or by e-mail at andrew.edwards@

latimes.com.