After graduation: Illini Success!

The Illini Success initiative was launched in August 2014 to gather career-related information about the next steps of bachelor’s degree recipients at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. The project was designed to tell the Illinois story with high quality information, updated annually.
 

Highlights of Engineering at Illinois' Success Report

• 88% of CoE graduates secure their first destination (employed, continuing their education, etc.)
• Traditional work environments employed the majority of College's bachelor’s degree graduates 88%; approximately 7% identifying transitional environments, and 1% in entrepreneurial or startup efforts.
• 22% of College of  Engineering graduates who secured a first destination are pursuing continued education.
• Average bachelor's starting salary: $69,627, which is 10% above the national average
• Average bachelor's signing bonuses: $6,407
• 900+ companies recruit our students and conduct more than 6,000 interviews yearly
• 2+ job offers per student, on average 
• 50% stay in Illinois; another 15% stay in the Midwest

Our Impact on Engineering

Engineering at Illinois graduates more world-class engineers every year than MIT, Stanford, and Caltech combined.

Enrollment for Academic Year 2015-16 was 9,145 Undergraduates and 3,422 Graduate Students

In 2015-2016, the graduating class was comprised of approximately 1,400 undergraduates (bachelors’ degrees) and 600 graduate degrees (master’s, professional master’s, PhD).       

These students have been the beneficiaries of leading innovative educational programs like iFoundry, IEFX, the Strategic Instructional Initiatives Program, the Emergent Behaviors of Integrated Cellular Systems (EBICS) and the Midwest Cancer Nanotechnology Training Center (M-CNTC) training programs, Illinois Cyber Security Scholars Program (ICSSP), and an NSF WIDER grant.

More Highlights:

• 84% of Engineering at Illinois graduates participated in one or more experiential learning activities
   (including internships, assistantships, study abroad, volunteer)
• 50%+ undergrads perform research
• $222 million in 2014-15 research expenditures
• The most-cited engineering faculty in the world, according to Thomson Reuters.
• Home to 30+ startup companies in one of the nation’s Top 10 cities for venture deals, per capita
• Ranked Top 5 among engineering students most prepared for the workforce, according to a Wall Street Journal survey of employers 

This year’s graduates join more than 80,000 living alumni. Among them are

• Founders of YouTube, Yelp, Bloom Energy, Flex-n-Gate, Grainger Industrial Supply, Tesla Motors, and PayPal   
• Six astronauts
• The CEO of BP   
• The owner of the Jacksonville Jaguars
• Numerous entrepreneurs, corporate managers, and educational leaders

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This Illini Success 2014-2015 Report for the College of Engineering focuses on the 2014-2015 bachelor’s degree graduates sharing what they are doing with their Illinois degrees. The report includes those who graduated in August 2014, December 2014, and May 2015.

In this first year of collecting campus-wide graduate outcomes data, we reached out to 1,788 bachelor’s degree recipients in the College of Engineering. After following this group for six months, we learned about the outcomes of 1,406 of our graduates. 

• 79% response rate for the class of 2014-2015 
• 81% male respondents, 19% female respondents
• Respondents by Ethnicity: 54% White; 19% International; 18% Asian; 2% Multi-Race; 1% African American; 1% Other.

The Illini Success intiative is a joint collaboration among the Office of the Provost, The Career Center, College of Engineering, and Division of Management Information.