Placements & Salary Survey 2008: Jobs and Pay Both Up

Despite a difficult economy and tightening budgets, both jobs and salaries rose for 2007 grads. Echoing the previous year's growth, reported annual salaries increased approximately 3.1%, from $41,014 in 2006 to $42,361. The picture was most positive for graduates in the Southeast, whose average annual starting salary surged past the $40,000 barrier that graduates there have been struggling to reach, increasing to $41,579, a significant gain of 8.2%. Minority graduates who found jobs in the Southeast also reported a reversal of fortunes, with average annual starting salaries up by 16.2% to $46,093, after falling to $39,674 in 2006.

In other highlights, academic libraries in the Northeast contributed to the improved job scene, with 11.8% more graduates hired and salaries up approximately 5.5% to $41,340. School library media specialists experienced higher placement rates in almost all regions of the United States and at worst held steady from the previous year, with commensurate salaries approximately 5.6% higher than in 2006.

There are many more positive aspects to note, with minorities and men faring even better than the 3.1% average overall rise in salaries, at 5.5% and 4.4% growth, respectively. The tremendous jump in salaries for new hires in the Southeast helped propel the overall average upward, with an additional boost from the extraordinarily high salaries garnered by the graduates of the University of Michigan (averaging $55,869, almost 32% above the rest). With the exception of the combined Canadian and international reporting, regional salaries across the board topped the $40,000 level, compared to 2006, when salaries in the Southeast, Midwest, and Southwest remained in the high $30,000s. Regionally, salary growth in the Northeast and in the Southwest was slightly lower than the average but nonetheless up from previous years. One real surprise was substantial growth in the number of graduates accepting professional positions as archivists. Compared with other types of jobs, archival placements comprise about 4.3% of the reported staffing. However, this was a 22% increase from the previous year. Archivists also experienced a 14.4% bump up in salary, to $40,286.

Nonetheless, 2007 was not without challenges. For a second year in a row, nonprofessional and temporary positions increased, hinting at the struggles many library systems face in maintaining high levels of service with fewer resources and personnel. The job search was a little longer and a little harder for many graduates, and reports indicate a continued rise in part-time positions.

Fewer responses from LIS graduates were received for 2007, though the response rate continues to fluctuate around 33%; over the last several survey periods it ranged from 30% to 40%. Of the approximate 5300 reported graduates, 1,768 responded. This has implications for measuring some placements, but overall percentages were consistent with previous years.

Public libraries continue to be a popular choice for employment, averaging 28% of the overall reported placements. This figure has held steady over the last several years, consistently hovering around 27% to 29%. Increased hires were reported in the Midwest (up approximately 12%); in the Southwest, graduates reported 12.2% more public library hires. Unfortunately, public library salaries in the Midwest and Southwest did not follow suit, dipping an average of 3.0% below 2006 averages.

An area of concern is children's services. Placements decreased, and salaries were flat for 2007. One possible explanation may be a redefining of the title to encompass both children's and youth services (teen and/or YA librarians), as there was a 3.6% increase in the number of grads reporting their job as youth services rather than children's. However, average starting salaries for youth services librarians decreased 3.53%, to $35,929. The other possibility for decreased numbers is the overall economic impact on library funding and the number of public libraries, which employ the majority of children's and youth services librarians, suffering layoffs and reductions in services.

School library media centers showed some of the best growth among all types of library and information science agencies in 2007. Placements in the Midwest, Southwest, and West increased substantially, averaging 26.8% growth across the three regions. At the same time, the overall average starting salary for new school library media specialists took a giant step up to $44,935 (an impressive 5.6% increase from $42,420 in 2006). This improvement was spurred by a 9.9% growth in salaries in the Southwest and 20% in the West. Some caution needs to be applied to the salary growth for school library media specialists, however, as many grads explain that their salaries are based on a standard teacher's pay scale for their states. As teachers move from the classroom to the media center, salary and compensation levels follow them; this means that the level they earned in the classroom will be their base for the media center positions and doesn't always indicate a pay increase with the achievement of the master's degree.

In light of recent professional discussions about tenure status for academic librarians, it seemed timely to explore graduate experiences in academic settings. Of the 416 graduates who accepted positions in academic libraries, 336 responded to inquiries regarding their faculty status and appointment. Surprisingly 81.2% were hired for nontenured positions, and only 3.2% of the new hires had nine-month (or academic year) appointments. (A question that was not explored but may address the tenure/nontenure conundrum is the number of academic librarians in community or junior colleges compared with those at tiered research institutions.)

The more interesting responses were from the academic librarians who described their appointments as “other.” This group comprised 21.9% of the responses to questions about the length of their service term (nine-month vs. 12-month). The appointments were described in a variety of ways, including grant-funded short-term, adjunct, semester by semester, and library fellows programs. One perhaps not unexpected finding was that the new academic librarians with tenure-earning status (18.8% of respondents) garnered starting salaries that were 8.8% higher than those of the nontenure-earning professionals and 6.7% higher than those of all new academic librarians ($43,634 compared to $40,090 and $40,911, respectively).

This year's survey provided real opportunities to examine the debate between library science and information science in more detail. In 2006 and again in 2007, graduates were asked to define whether their jobs were information science (IS), library science (LS), or other. Of the 1,347 graduates who responded to the question, 75.8% stated that their jobs were definitely LS, 9.2% claimed IS (down slightly from 2006), and the remaining 15% described their positions as falling into other professional areas, most frequently as grant-supported positions, corporate affiliation, or education (classroom teachers and higher education). The “other” category was also used for many of the reported archival positions.

The LS vs. IS question represents more than philosophical underpinnings and types of jobs (user experience interface designer vs. reference/information specialist, for example). For some it shows a significant difference in salary. A straight dollar-to-dollar comparison suggests that graduates describing their jobs as IS earned almost 20% more on average for their starting salaries than other graduates ($48,354 compared to $40,308). Five of the iSchools Caucus members reported average starting salaries significantly above the overall averages (ranging from 9.6% higher to a whopping 31.9% higher). Interestingly, though higher overall, the IS salaries remained flat between 2006 and 2007 while the salaries for LS jobs improved by 1.8%.

On the other hand, designation as an I-school and membership in the iSchools Caucus seem to have less impact on how the graduates defined themselves. The IS graduates who clearly identified themselves with information science made up only 28% of the IS pool.

The combination of regionality and IS designation also played a role in salary achievements. Graduates who accepted jobs on the West Coast historically attained higher salaries than others. In 2007, the pay difference was 19.7% (or $8,375) for all graduates. Salary differences were even more apparent when regional placement was compared among the IS graduates. Graduates identifying IS positions on the West Coast earned 36.3% higher salaries than the entire pool of IS grads. The graduates who defined their jobs as IS-related in the Midwest, where overall salaries were among the lowest in 2007, negotiated the lowest salaries for positions.

In light of the LS vs. IS debate, a few unexpected trends among the individual schools' placements emerged along with several predictable ones. Graduates of University of Washington, an I-school, for example, reported 42.9% of their placements in public libraries when one might anticipate there would be higher placements in other types of agencies among I-school graduates. Despite high placements in libraries with traditionally lower salary ranges, Washington grads maintained one the highest average salaries among all of the programs. Southern Connecticut State University, an L-school, followed the same trend of 42.9% placements in public libraries with better than average starting salaries. Comparatively, University of Kentucky, an L-school*, saw graduates reporting 53.6% placement in public libraries but garnering the lowest average salary levels among the programs. In these instances, location played a more a significant role in determining salary than did the type of library, while being from an I-school or an L-school had little impact.

In a much more predictable pattern, the University of Michigan (UM), an I-school, dominated the “other” category, placing 56.3% of its graduates in agencies such as consulting, e-commerce, financial services, and interactive marketing. Many of these employers are private entities unaffected by public funding, thus allowing salaries to be highly competitive. Pratt, an L-school, and the University of Texas at Austin, an I-school, had the next highest percentages of placements in “other” agencies (28.6% and 26.7%, respectively). On average, the LIS graduates comprised 16.7% of the overall reported placements in “other” institutions, with UM making up 19.5% of the reported total.

Graduates of UCLA, Syracuse, and Oklahoma reported the highest percentage of positions in academic libraries, ranging from 50% to 75% of the reported placements. Alabama, Denver, and Illinois also had above average placements in academic libraries. SUNY-Buffalo, University of North Texas, and Texas Woman's University had the strongest showing among the LIS programs in school library media centers, averaging 33.5% of the media specialist positions. The graduating class reported the fewest placements in special libraries, at 8.1% of the jobs; however, St. John's University, Louisiana State, and Simmons grads were well above this average, with Simmons snagging 17.5% of the total positions in special libraries.

Recent issues of the annual placements and salaries survey have given cursory exploration of salary parity between the genders as well as minority comparisons. There is no doubt that the gaps continue to exist and even widen. Women experienced another year of salary growth in 2007, but for another year's running they lagged approximately 7.7% behind men. The question that begs to be answered is, “What factors are driving the differences?”

Proportionately, women continue to comprise 80% of the new members of the LIS workforce. However, smaller proportions of women found positions in academic libraries (72.9%), government libraries (68.9%), and other agencies and organizations (67.4%) while dominating the school library media positions (93.9%). Average starting salaries for women in public libraries and special libraries fell while men experienced significant gains (as much as 9.1% compared to a loss of 8.4% for women) in the same type of agencies. Regionally, women who accepted school library media positions in the Southeast and the Southwest fared better than their male counterparts (slightly more than 4% and higher). The same situation occurred in special libraries in the Northeast and the Southeast, with women earning 3.7% and 4.6% more, respectively. Government libraries was the one agency where women dominated the salary game with average starting pay 22% higher than men, earning $46,540 compared to $38,138.

Historically school library media centers and “other” organizations generate higher average starting salaries. In both of these types of agencies, women experienced a comfortable salary growth, averaging just over 5% in each. School library media specialists are members of the teaching faculty and in most states are required to obtain formal teaching credentials. Much like the overall education profession, school library media positions are dominated by women (94% of the placements), and they have been subject to the same glass ceiling that many other female-dominated professions experience. Starting salaries for women in school media centers continue to fall below the levels men obtain. The rate of growth in salaries also reveals a gap, with a 12.2% differential between women and men ($44,602 compared to an average starting salary of $50,038).

Even though they continue to lag behind men with regard to starting salaries for “other” agencies, women gained 5.1% in their starting salaries (from $47,163 in 2006). The best salary growth for women in “other “organizations was in the Midwest, with better than 17% upward movement. The percentage of women finding jobs in other agencies grew from 64% of the placements in 2006 to 66% of the placements in 2007. These positions included jobs in nonprofits, museums, Fortune 500 companies, and medical facilities.

Region seems to play a role in salary equity for women. In 2007, more women (approximately 30%) accepted positions in the Midwest than across the rest of the U.S. regions and Canada. In 2006 and again in 2007 average starting salaries were among the lowest in the Midwest, and women there followed the same pattern, taking among the lowest paid spots accepted ($38,638 in 2006; $39,844 in 2007), though there was a trend toward modest growth from year to year. On a positive note: following the general rise in salaries in the Southeast, women gained just over 8% in average starting salary, narrowing the gender gap in the Southeast to 4.9%.

Background and experience are yet another piece in the gender puzzle. Interesting trends emerge from those who reported LIS as a second career (and in some cases “too many careers to name”). Women responding to the survey typically reported first careers in education, human services, nonprofit agencies, and the arts, while men reported jobs in law, medicine, science, and engineering. Starting salaries for women with prior professional experience were approximately 3.4% higher than the average starting salary for all women ($43,154 compared to $41,731); for men, the difference was more substantial, with $47,877 for those reporting previous careers to $45,192 for all men. This suggests that the glass ceiling migrates to the LIS professions along with career changers, though prior professional experience can help in general.

The other gap that exists is one of diversity. That said, graduates claiming ethnic and racial minority status fared better in the marketplace than did women in general. In 2007, approximately 11.8% of the graduating class claimed minority status. This has been consistent across the last several reporting periods, ranging from 12% in 2005 to 10.7% in 2006. Along with the ALA Spectrum Scholarship program, several of the LIS schools have received IMLS grants and other funding to recruit actively and retain minority students, and the profession is seeing the fruits of these efforts.

From 2006 to 2007, average starting salaries for minority graduates popped by 5.1%, growing from $40,750 to $42,831 and exceeding the 2005 high of $42,233. Contributing to the surge was an unprecedented 10.9% rise in salaries for minorities in the Southeast. This echoes the other signs of health in the Southeast. Unfortunately, a gender gap exists for minority graduates as well, with men earning 3.8% higher starting salaries than women ($44,828 compared to $43,656 in 2007). Much like the other positive trends for school library media centers, minority salaries sizzled for media specialists, with a 12.9% increase to $47,248.

While the proportion of minority placements remained steady in most library and information agency types between 2006 and 2007, an increasing number of graduates accepted positions in “other” agencies, and received higher salaries accordingly. In 2006, just over 11% of the minority graduates found jobs in such organizations, including nonprofits, private industry, and other nontraditional positions; in 2007, the placement rate grew to 16.8%. Average starting compensation in nonlibrary jobs for minority grads grew from $45,203 to $47,963, though it still stumbled behind the overall salary ($51,349) for all new graduates in “other” organizations.

Over the past several years a greater and more diverse representation of job assignments and types of organizations has lured LIS graduates, especially in the area of information science. Schools and graduates are reporting many intriguing job titles and responsibilities, such as user experience design and interface, information preservation, social computing and networking, and e-commerce. The opportunities are boundless—though not always easy to find. Graduates also note employment in museums, archives, and public programming (NPR, PBS, etc.). Many of these jobs can be broken into three designations: nonprofits, private industry, and the ubiquitous “other.”

In order to understand the distribution of the new job types better, we asked graduates to identify and describe “other” designations. Of the 297 graduates who responded, approximately 13.1% accepted positions in nonprofit agencies, 57.9% were in “other” agencies or outside of the LIS professions, and 29% described their employers as private industry. The salary implications were far reaching, both for the graduates claiming “other” status and compared to the rest of their graduating class. On average, graduates choosing “other” organizations reached salary levels approximately 21.2% higher than their counterparts ($51,349 compared to $42,361). But within the other category, salaries swung wildly, with the salaries of those describing positions in the nonprofit sector significantly lower than those in private industry ($43,519 vs. $60,677—a 39.4% difference).

Salary differentials also highlighted the gender gap, though, interestingly, salaries were basically equal in private industry, with women earning an average of $61,100 and men an average of $61,068. The salary disparity was greatest for women in the nonprofit sector, with a 34% gap between them and their male counterparts (an average of $39,975 compared to $53,643). Some of this may be owing to the small pool of men, thus a much smaller range of salaries. It also appears that many of the women accepted clerical-type positions while the men focused on IT jobs in the nonprofits. However, the “other” organizations, including university units outside of the library or IT departments, hospitals, and other educational institutions, experienced a similar, though lesser, gap of almost 16% between salaries for women and men.

Two factors stood out in private industry in particular and the “other” category as a whole. First, the regional distribution of jobs in private industry had the highest placements in the West (approximately 26.7% of the placements), especially in California, which historically garners the highest salaries. Graduates accepting positions in other organizations in the West reported an average starting salary of $59,428 (15.7% higher than other grads reporting similar jobs). Secondly, the information school/library school dichotomy played out again, with UM placing 41% of the grads in private industry, and the combined I-schools placing 37.7% of the grads in “other” organizations overall. As noted, Michigan graduates are at the pinnacle of the LIS salary scale, with an average annual starting salary of $55,869. Six of the other iSchool Caucus members top the list of above-average salaries as well.

For some, the transition from graduate student to employed professional was seamless. Of the 1,546 graduates reporting employment, a full 41% remained with their current employer (compared to 36.9% in 2006 and 37% in 2005) while completing the master's degree; of these grads, 77.3% were placed in professional positions. For some, this meant a promotion from support staff and library technical assistant to professional staff. For others, there was no change in professional status but simply the addition of an “official” credential for the job they were already doing.

Encouragingly, nearly 42% of all graduates found employment prior to graduation, which is slightly less than the previous year (46%) but well above the historical trends, ranging from 30% in 2003 to 25.2% in 2005. As in the past, grads began the job search well in advance of graduation day to ensure a smooth transition and no loss of income. A number of recent grads pointed to volunteer activities in libraries and other information agencies, previous experience, and fieldwork or internships as real boosts to landing positions.

The job search was an exercise in frustration for many graduates. It meant taking temporary work while seeking “better, more appropriate professional positions.” In a disturbing pattern, temporary placements increased again in 2007, with approximately 12.5% grads placed in temporary jobs (up from just over 10% in 2006 and 8.5% in 2005). While temporary status frequently implies that the job will cease at the end of a contractual period and without guarantees for the future, many graduates were quick to suggest that “temporary” is not always a bad thing. Temporary positions help them gain valuable work experience while continuing to search for permanent placements in areas and job types more suited to their needs.

Graduates with part-time positions held steady for a second year at approximately 16.2%. The majority of part-time positions were located in the Northeast (42.1%), followed by the Midwest (24%). The Southeast had the least amount of reported part-time positions (7.3%). Public libraries and academic libraries continue to employ the highest levels of part-timers, with 40% and 23% of the part-time pool, respectively, comparable to 2006 levels. Part-time positions in both of these types of agencies may be another indication of the impact of a soft economy and lower operating budgets. An intriguing side note regarding those graduates who said they had two or more part-time jobs, most frequently holding one in a public library along with one in an academic library. While one might assume the nonprofessional positions would be more likely to be part-time, positions in reference and information services saw the highest level of part-time staffing at 30% of the reported positions.

More than a few graduates shared their stories of many, many interviews but very few real job offers. The overall length of time from graduation to landing a professional position increased from four-and-a-half months in 2006 to just shy of five months in 2007, and some were still looking over a year after graduation. The most frequent advice graduates offered to their future colleagues included “Network, network, network, early in your program,” “Find good mentors,” and “Get as much experience as you can during your program to prepare yourself for the realities of the workplace.”

The LIS programs had a slightly different perspective, with more than 60% of the participating schools saying that they felt it was no harder placing graduates in 2007 than it had been the year before. In general, the LIS programs provided a broad range of access to job announcements and placement services, through electronic mail lists, bulletin boards, professional organizations and student chapters, and the schools' own web sites. However, only approximately 30% of the reporting institutions offer a formal placement and/or career service for their graduates.

Several of the LIS programs created a variety of mentoring programs for incoming and current students as well as recent graduates. Drexel University launched a new Alumni Mentoring Program in which alumni of the iSchool programs serve as mentors for prospective students, current students, and other alumni. In a similar effort, Drexel also launched a Graduate Peer Mentoring Program to connect successful graduate students with new and continuing students. The University of Alabama features a Mentoring Day to assist its students with job placement. The University of Texas at Austin, University of Washington, University of Rhode Island, and Simmons each have either career mentoring, faculty mentoring, and/or peer-to-peer mentoring programs to help ensure the success of their graduates.

The LIS Class of 2007 experienced both tremendous opportunities and disappointments as they sought jobs in a slowing economic environment. Nationwide, library and information organizations suffered from loss of revenue in property taxes and state funding, corporate slowdowns, and reduced spending. For some, this meant lower salaries, longer job searches, and temporary posts while waiting for permanent employment. On the flip side, salaries in the Southeast surged upward, and placements in many types of agencies around the nation increased. The gender gap widened, but women experienced solid growth in salaries in the Southeast and the Southwest and significant in-roads in government libraries. All indications from the graduates and the programs responding are that the LIS profession continues to be viable, even healthy, and forward looking.

For expanded coverage, including detail on specializations, graphs, and more, go to the web version of this article at www.libraryjournal.com/salaries2008

TABLE 1: STATUS OF 2007 GRADUATES