Ranking college majors is something of an industry unto itself, but it's not a game that need be limited to large institutions like U.S. News and World Report, Princeton Review or PayScale.
Anybody with a unique analytical approach and the ability to crunch the data can step up to the plate, and that is what Pepperdine University law professor Robert Anderson has done in a new post on his Witnesseth blog that focuses on "law, deals and data."
Anderson writes that he wanted to test the oft-expressed notion that a student's choice of majors is not determinative of success but that students should freely follow their passions in a variety of areas that develop one's critical thinking.
By culling data on senior level directors of publicly traded corporations, for whom publicly available annual reports or proxy statements often include executives' educational background, the Pepperdine professor found a pattern in their preponderant fields of study.
Closely tracking studies by PayScale that show STEM majors to be the most lucrative college majors, Anderson's list may prove sobering news for any fine arts majors aspiring to climb the corporate ladder (rather than work in, well, the arts). That is because liberal arts majors (with one possible exception, depending on one's definition) consistently filled the bottom of his list.
Anderson would not speculate as to what makes such majors deficient, telling ThinkAdvisor that one could not make that inference from the data.
But the pattern he did observe in the majors associated with business success "tend to be focused and rigorous, have at least a potential application to commercial ventures, require coursework that can be objectively graded as 'correct' or 'incorrect,' and require engagement with quantitative ideas or data."
(If you got a business degree with aspirations to run the world, check out 14 Best Paying Jobs for College Business Majors: 2014.)
While few of the senior most corporate leaders have backgrounds in English, ethnic, cultural and gender studies, journalism, sociology or the performing arts (note: business administration didn't rank high either), high proportions had these majors:
15. Electrical Engineering
Execs Per Degree: 0.0261
Total Execs Count: 485
Total Degrees Awarded: 18,615
Today's world is a wired one, and electronics is now and integral part of every field, so its appearance on the list of top majors would surprise no one reading this story on a computer or mobile device.
14. Mathematics and Statistics
Execs Per Degree: 0.0269
Total Execs Count: 392
Total Degrees Awarded: 14,549
Math develops one's problem-solving abilities, and statistics is vital to deriving meaning from the ocean of data that professionals must swim in today.
13. Materials Science
Execs Per Degree: 0.0278
Total Execs Count: 28
Total Degrees Awarded: 1,007
Materials matter, and our industry and economy are dependent on people who have the training to extract, process, test and even develop new materials.
12. Agriculture and Biological Engineering
Execs Per Degree: 0.0308
Total Execs Count: 20
Total Degrees Awarded: 648
Because food will never go out of fashion, there will likely always be work for those who can assure food safety, water purity and the like.
11. Engineering (General)
Execs Per Degree: 0.0314
Total Execs Count: 266
Total Degrees Awarded: 8,465
The discipline of engineering can give someone the ability to help a company optimally implement a variety of systems involving manpower, materials and equipment.
10. Accounting
Execs Per Degree: 0.0355
Total Execs Count: 1630
Total Degrees Awarded: 45,868
If money makes the world go round, then executives need those who can provide financial information in ways that help them make better decisions.
9. Chemistry
Execs Per Degree: 0.0433
Total Execs Count: 467
Total Degrees Awarded: 10,794
Chemistry bridges the physical and biological sciences, so besides providing a foundation with broad industrial applications, the intellectual rigor for which the discipline is known is also valued by employers.
8. Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering
Execs Per Degree: 0.0498
Total Execs Count: 194
Total Degrees Awarded: 3,896
For employers requiring a systematic approach to analyzing a factory or organization based on factors such as output, quality, cost or management effectiveness, this major has great practical value.
7. Geology
Execs Per Degree: 0.0504
Total Execs Count: 174
Total Degrees Awarded: 3,449
Employers want people who are grounded, and that's what geology majors are, knowing where to locate and extract vital minerals and other subterranean resources.
6. Physics
Execs Per Degree: 0.0525
Total Execs Count: 228
Total Degrees Awarded: 4,340
While famous for the law of relativity and other cosmological insights, physics is crucial to the development of a wide range of technologies, from lasers used by generals, for example, to those used by dermatologists.
5. Chemical Engineering
Execs Per Degree: 0.0548
Total Execs Count: 317
Total Degrees Awarded: 5,786
Chemistry involves the stuff of life, and chemical engineers can take that stuff and make products out of them, or processes to utilize them.
4. Engineering Science and Physics
Execs Per Degree: 0.0621
Total Execs Count: 26
Total Degrees Awarded: 418
Combining engineering skills with practial knowledge of the physical universe also goes by the name of Silicon Valley these days.
3. Economics
Execs Per Degree: 0.0845
Total Execs Count: 2,089
Total Degrees Awarded: 24,736
Surprise! A non-STEM field ranks high on the list. Some even consider economics a liberal art, though others insist it is a science. In any event, knowledge of the environment of goods and services in which businesses operate is highly prized by employers.
2. Mining Engineering
Execs Per Degree: 0.1356
Total Execs Count: 32
Total Degrees Awarded: 236
Mining engineers put the silicon in Silicon Valley. As long as basic materials are needed, whether as fillings in your teeth or as gems in your jewelry, mining engineers will in demand.
1. Petroleum Engineering
Execs Per Degree: 0.4435
Total Execs Count: 177
Total Degrees Awarded: 399
"Houston, we've got a problem!" That problem could involve rocket fuel, or the extraction of oil from shale that has begun to restore the vital energy independence that has eluded the country for several decades now.
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