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Study Shows Students Who Major In Astronomy Have Zero Unemployment

By Kim Glovas

PHILADELPHIA (CBS) - If you have a college age student with an undeclared major, you may want to steer them into astronomy.

The study was done by the Georgetown Center on Education and the Workforce. It showed that students with an undergraduate major of Astronomy and Astrophysics had zero unemployment. Yes, zero.

Ed Fitzpatrick, chair of the astronomy department at Villanova University, says one of the reasons for this trend is the skills that go with the major.

"They're getting lots of training in computer skills or math literacy, they're very good with numbers, they have to be to do the work we do. They come out with a good handle on problem solving skills. In astronomy, we want to know things about stars that are very, very far away and we have to know how to get that information."

Fitzpatrick says right now, it's the Golden Age of Astronomy because of all the equipment up in the heavens that is brand new. And someone has to know how to retrieve that information and analyze it.

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