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"  Well, this is puzzling career news: According to a new study, women who&amp;#039;ve graduated from the most elite undergraduate universities in the country are more likely to leave the workplace, at least part-time, than women who graduated from less selective institutions.  Vanderbilt professor Joni Hersch, the researcher behind the study, says these ladies are primed to succeed in their career paths, yet many are opting not to: Just 60 percent of female graduates from so-called &amp;quot;elite&amp;quot; colleges are working full-time compared to 68 percent of women from other schools. While it may seem like a small margin, these numbers make a big statement, Hersch says. &amp;quot;Even though elite graduates are more likely to earn advanced degrees, marry at later ages and have higher expected earnings, they are still opting out of full-time work at much higher rates than other graduates,&amp;quot; she says.  Hersch found that having kids is the major reason why these women cut back on work: Among elite graduates, married women without children are 20 percent more likely to be employed than those with children, while that difference in the probability of employment is 13.5 percent for non-elite graduates. The odd thing about this is that the women who went to better schools presumably command higher salaries and have more job choices\u2014the latter meaning, in many cases, a better chance for flexibility.  Perhaps these ladies followed the recent controversial advice of Princeton alum Susan Patton and used their time at these choice schools to get their MRS degrees\u2014and maybe they landed successful hubbies who make enough dough so they don&amp;#039;t have to work. Or maybe they&amp;#039;ve figured out how to make it rain without having to put in as much time as the rest of us.  But that can&amp;#039;t be true of all of these highly-educated women, right? And even if it were, research shows that women are happier when they share both household and bread-winning duties with their partner, rather than following more a gender-divided model in which the guy works and the woman takes care of the home and kids. (This is something that Sheryl Sandberg points out in Lean In.)  Another study released today from Brigham Young University and Utah State University confirms that sharing domestic responsibility makes for a better relationship\u2014and life. While duties don&amp;#039;t have to be split 50/50, the more women perceived that their partners were engaged in family-related tasks, the happier both men and women were as a couple.  So, while we&amp;#039;re certainly not judging women who decide to opt out (choose your choice, ladies!), these very-educated women could be better off keeping those careers. First of all, we need more super smart ladies kicking ass in high-level positions, which typically go to people who went to those selective schools, as Hersch noted in her study .  But on a couple-to-couple level, figuring out work/life balance as a team is not only more fair\u2014why should women put in all that effort to get into a top school and then not actually use their education?\u2014and actually makes family life stronger and more satisfying. Seems like a win-win to us.  Want more from Natasha? Follow her on Twitter or find her on Facebook. "^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://www.cosmopolitan.com/career/news/a12373/educated-women-opting-out/?src=global_footer>