YMCAs Featured In Princeton Review Book,"Best Entry-Level Jobs: 2008 Edition"

New workers join the YMCA of Greater Rochester to be fulfilled, be inspired and make a difference every day

For the fourth consecutive year, America’s YMCAs rank among the top organizations and companies in the U.S. for college grads to launch their careers, according to The Princeton Review.  The New York-based education services company profiles the YMCA in the new 2008 edition of its book, "Best Entry-Level Jobs" (Random House / Princeton Review Books).  The Princeton Review salutes the nation’s largest not-for-profit community services organization for offering a flexible schedule and plenty of responsibility to entry-level workers.

The Princeton Review highlights that YMCAs, such as the YMCA of Greater Rochester seek candidates “with a passion for positively influencing the lives of others,” as well as “a commitment to the mission of the YMCA, the ability to thrive in a fast-paced environment, a strong sense of customer service, a commitment to applying ethics and values in the workplace, and technical skills in a specific program area of not-for-profit administrative application.” 

“We are thrilled to be recognized by the Princeton Review as a leading place in America for entry-level jobs,” said the YMCA of Greater Rochester. “At the YMCA of Greater Rochester we provide meaningful work full of rich learning opportunities.  Many of our employees began their careers as member-service coordinators, moving on to succeed at Director- and Executive-level positions.”

YMCAs maintain relationships with colleges and universities around the country, and many students begin their work with the YMCA long before they have even graduated, The Princeton Review notes. With a commitment to YMCA core values of caring, honesty, respect and responsibility, entry-level employees are finding the YMCA to be a place where they are “at a front line for helping to meet people’s needs.”

Published since 2003, "Best Entry-Level Jobs" identifies great workplaces for new grads based on hundreds of interviews with entry-level employees and employers at companies across the country.  For the 2008 edition, The Princeton Review chose 114 companies or organizations.   Among them readers will find opportunities in both the for-profit and nonprofit sectors, as well as across several industries and in many fields from accounting to technology.

In their introduction, the book's co-authors Ron Lieber and Tom Meltzer described their criteria for selecting companies for the book:  "We wanted to find places where people were happy, engaged with their work, nicely compensated, well positioned for advancement, getting great preparation for graduate school, doing really interesting stuff, or benefiting from any combination of these things."

"Best Entry-Level Jobs" is one of more than 200 books developed by The Princeton Review in a line published by Random House.  The Princeton Review (www.princetonreview.com) is an education services company known for its popular test-prep courses, books, college and grad school admission services and other education programs.  It is not a magazine, and it is not affiliated with Princeton University.