“Students’ worldview is a little more anxious and serious about how the hell do I fit into this,” adds her husband.

But even with these factors encouraging public service, public sector jobs have some drawbacks.

Ainsworth notes unlike her private sector counterparts at job fairs, civil service hiring procedures make her unable to immediately offer positions, or even interviews.

And while Ainsworth says she has seen an increased interest particularly in jobs with the foreign service or the CIA among Harvard students, the application process for such jobs can be quite time-consuming.

Greg T. Delawie ’80, director of policy coordination for the Bureau of Human Resources at the State Department, says those interested in foreign service positions must wait to take the Foreign Service Examination, which is given only once a year.

And even after taking the test, necessary background checks and interviews mean that attractive candidates likely will have to wait another 10 months for a job offer—although this is down from the 27-month wait that existed in the late 1990s.

Staying in the Academy

While this year applications to graduate and professional schools increased nationwide, with a record-setting number of people taking the LSAT, this trend has been less pronounced at Harvard.

Twenty-five percent of Harvard College graduates traditionally head straight for graduate or professional school after Commencement. Wright-Swadel says this year’s statistics seem to be within a few percent of that average.

Although attendance at initial interest meetings saw a “dramatic increase” over the past two years, pre-med tutor Miller says medical school applications by seniors in Eliot House are running at an average pace. She notes that applications to medical school tend to vary little with the economy, given the numerous course requirements pre-meds must complete.

Instead of more seniors immediately continuing with school, Wright-Swadel suggests that the decline in the economy is causing students to spend less time out in the workforce after graduation—maybe only one or two years today instead of two or three years in the past—before continuing their studies.

The trends in applications to law school from Dunster House fit this pattern. While pre-law tutor Freeman says the number of seniors in the House applying to law school has remained around 20 for the past several years, in the past three years the number of alums of the House applying has surged from three to almost 30.

Yet the trend was not reflected in all Houses.

Kirkland House pre-law tutor Jim O. Friedman says his House had few alums applying to law school this year. Adams House saw a substantial increase in all applicants this year, according to Onie.

Even if the numbers of Harvard seniors applying to graduate schools remained fairly constant, the national surge in applications did affect the chances of getting into choice programs.