State employment data that track the earnings of recent graduates show those who earned a career-focused associate’s degree or postsecondary certificate from a Florida community college are in many cases making more money than bachelor’s degree recipients at state universities.
What the numbers say: Bachelor’s degree recipients from the state’s 11 public universities earned an average starting salary of $36,552 in 2009. Meanwhile, those who received associate in science degrees from Florida community colleges earned an average of $47,708 — a difference of $11,000 more per year.
Vasquez suggests that this earning differentially may have to do with two things. The first is that community colleges “are dominated by job-specific training courses for occupations,” which means students have a certificate demonstrating that they can do something really specific, right away. Floridians with bachelor’s degrees, in contrast, often don’t have such a clear demonstration that they have practical skills, and that’s why they don’t get paid at much for their starting salaries.
The other reason for the surprising earning gap has to do with experience. In general people get paid more the more experience they have. Because people who earn associate degrees from community colleges are frequently nontraditional students; they often begin their college encounter with significant work experience. This allows them to command a higher salary than traditional college graduates, 22-year-olds with no work experience.