Career Development

"I met Dorothy Walker in my first year of Shades Valley High School, one of several schools in the Birmingham, Ala., area. Confident of little and terrified of much, I entered the honors section of her 10th-grade English class. Known to us simply as Mrs. Walker, she began by using the prescribed curriculum to shape and mold us as her students. Without my realizing it, she began teaching me a lesson that took me three graduate degrees, 24 years of service in higher education, and countless life experiences to understand: the enormous impact educators can have on their students."

"Starting salaries of new physicians reveal a growing gender gap. Newly-trained women doctors are being paid significantly lower salaries -about $17,000 less - than their male counterparts, found a new study published in the February issue of Health Affairs."

"Demand for U.S. workers who speak foreign languages-especially Spanish and Chinese-should continue to grow over the next decade, but very few workers plan to study them, according to a newly released study by the University of Phoenix Research Institute."

"The number of online listings containing the keywords "HTML5," "Mobile app," and "Android," have skyrocketed over the past year, making them the fastest growing keywords in jobs posted online, according to data tracked by jobs search engine Indeed.com."

"As Adecco Group North America CEO Tig Gilliam is closely watching the job market. Mr. Gilliam's company, which is part of Switzerland-based Adecco S.A., provides outsourcing services, temp workers and consulting to more than 100,000 clients worldwide. In North America; it has about 900 offices with more than 100,000 staff on assignment and about 4,850 full-time employees. "

"Facebook gaffes that can cause trouble in the workplace aren't unique to drunken college students anymore. As more companies and their workers tap into the world of blogs, Twitter and Facebook, employers are tripping over legal potholes in social media."

"Daniel Nicholson firmly believes in the value of company loyalty. At 46, the vice president of global quality has worked at General Motors in Detroit for 29 years, though he admits that his longevity isn't the norm."

"If you're like most entrepreneurs, you have a lengthy to-do list that never seems doable-no matter how many hours you work. But there's a reason you're not ticking off items, or maximizing results when you do. You've likely organized your task list by deadlines, and you're cranking away on the most pressing items first. A better, smarter approach is to prioritize your list by what matters most."

"While working as a spa coordinator at a luxury resort in Stowe, Vt., Laura Crandall got a sense that her boss was unhappy and thinking of moving on. So Ms. Crandall trained for her boss's job by volunteering for more work, pursuing mentorships and attending management seminars."

"There are nearly 14 million people looking for a job, but few have the skills to fill the four computer engineering openings at Gowalla Inc."

"When the number of employees Matt Kaplan managed at a lab at the University of Arizona in Tucson mushroomed from six to 30, the school called in a management coach to make sure he was prepared. What he learned surprised him-his employees thought he was distant and didn't trust their work. "The biggest challenge for me was realizing I couldn't do everything myself," he says. "I had to learn to trust my team, which was a gradual process." Experts say many bosses are similarly clueless about their appearance to employees. Here are five signals you may be one of them."

" In 2004, I left a technology company and jumped right into the insurance business. Now I really want to return to tech, but I am having a tough time overcoming and explaining this change. I believe I received very good insight and will do a better job now. How can I convey this to a new potential employer?"

"Community colleges, long regarded as the most accessible realm of higher education, are becoming more difficult to access thanks to record enrollments combined with belt-tightening by state legislatures."

"Matthew Gonzales Sanchez calls it his "midterm crisis." Halfway through the first semester of his freshman year here at Our Lady of the Lake University, he considered dropping out. He had failed all of his midterms. "It scared me because, man, I was giving it my all," says Mr. Gonzales Sanchez, 22. "I thought, 'What am I doing wrong? They say college isn't for everybody, and maybe that's me - maybe I'm not one of those people who belongs in college.'""

"For Valentine's Day on Monday, Amy McMahon will be celebrating twice. She's preparing a romantic candlelight dinner for her longtime boyfriend and giving him a gift card from his favorite fitness website. That same day, Ms. McMahon will be giving her "work husband" some small heart-shaped cakes and a sentimental card."

College students work for different reasons. Many take jobs to pay tuition and related educational expenses. Others work to afford electronic gadgets (often ones that we, their professors, don't yet know exist). Regardless of the reasons, many professors and administrators consider students' working during college to be an unfortunate distraction from what should be their primary focus: their academic studies.

"Giving kids' allowances raises lots of questions for parents: How much to pay? Should the money be tied to chores - and if so, which ones? Can the kids spend the money freely, or must they save part of it?"

"In the last few years, leadership programs have sprung up in remarkable numbers at colleges and universities across the country. Institutions as diverse as Creighton University, Arizona State University, and Highland Community College, in Illinois, now offer leadership training and opportunities to their students. Some universities and colleges, like Gonzaga and the City University of Seattle, have developed degree programs in leadership, and many more such programs are being planned. It seems that every university Web page and presidential message now highlights leadership opportunities for students at both the undergraduate and graduate levels."

"When should a small-business owner promote an employee?"

"I recently received a call to set up an interview for a job for which I applied a while back. This should be great news, but I'm starting to get nervous because I exaggerated a couple of my responsibilities on my résumé. What if questions about them get raised during the interview? Should I say something right at the beginning or just wait and see if they come up?"