This Brookings research provides students with information about the quality of job opportunities in the 100 largest metro areas. With this interactive, students select a metro area and immediately get a read on the job market in that area. When these interactives allow students to understand their community better, we know it will engage them. 

Here's Durham-Chapel Hill, NC as an example:

As you can see the chart is color-coded based on four job categories:

• Promising jobs defined as "entry-level positions from which most workers can reach a good job within 10 years."
• Good jobs "provide stable employment, middle-class wages and benefits."
• High-skill jobs are "good and promising jobs held by workers with a bachelor's degree." 
• Other jobs are "all other jobs." 

Questions:

• Using data from this chart, how would you describe the quality of jobs in this metro area? 
• Which job categories have the highest percentage of high-skill jobs?
• Which job category has the highest percentage of "good jobs?"
• How would you think about the "other jobs" category? Are they better than "high skilled jobs" or not? 
• Using data from this chart, does having a bachelor's degree open up more opportunities for workers? 

Activity idea: Have students pick two metro areas that they are interested in and compare the quality of jobs there. Their task is to identify which metro area would be a better fit for them based on their educational and career goals. 

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The other interactive your students should engage with provides a more macro view of a metro area economy by identifying the percentage of jobs that fit into each job category. For example, here's San Jose, CA's profile:

What's cool about this interactive is that as you scroll over the individual bars the metro area appears not only on one chart but all three. 

Question:

• Your friend plans to start working after high school and says "I've always wanted to move to sunny California and I hear San Jose is perfect for someone without a college degree>" Waht would you tell him based on the data in this chart?
• Which city might be best for workers without a bachelor's degree? 
• Do you think that jobs held by workers with a bachelor's degree pay more? Explain.

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Check out more of our interactives in our Interactive Library! 

About the Author

Tim Ranzetta

Tim's saving habits started at seven when a neighbor with a broken hip gave him a dog walking job. Her recovery, which took almost a year, resulted in Tim getting to know the bank tellers quite well (and accumulating a savings account balance of over $300!). His recent entrepreneurial adventures have included driving a shredding truck, analyzing executive compensation packages for Fortune 500 companies and helping families make better college financing decisions. After volunteering in 2010 to create and teach a personal finance program at Eastside College Prep in East Palo Alto, Tim saw firsthand the impact of an engaging and activity-based curriculum, which inspired him to start a new non-profit, Next Gen Personal Finance.