Like C17 Driver, I was a finance major myself, so I'll give my $.02. Like it has already been stated, max out your Roth IRA due to the tax bennefits that come along with Roth IRA's. As Spar stated, an emergency fund is a great thing to have. As far as savings go, CD's are a good way to go as they offer higher interest rates than ordinary savings accounts with terms as low as 91 days with a rate of 2.4% through USAA. CD's bennefits include a locked in rate of return which is risk free. On the flipside, you face penalties for early withdrawals.
For those that don't know what an ETF (exchange traded fund), these make for a convenient way to diversify risk from your portfolio. An ETF, or index fund, is much like a mutual fund that is traded in the form of a stock which has bennefits of stocks and mutual funds combined, more or less. Examples include SPDRs (tracks the S&P 500, ticker: SPY) and QQQQ (Nasdaq 100). ETF's have a beta of around 1 meaning that they are about as risky as the market as a whole and theoretically produce market returns. Financial analysts last week predicted that the S&P 500 will be on the rise. From last week, the value of SPDRs went from 119.05 to 120.5 at close today.
Bottom line is that if you plan to invest in more than just money market funds, bonds, etc, you will be taking on risk. A young lad like myself can take on more risk than someone that plans to retire next month simply because I have alot more time to make it back. I personally am kicking myself in the butt for not buying Google when it opened at around 95 or so when its now at like 288. Those kinds of returns are very risky especially given the industry.
Investments to flat out avoid: Futures: to include oil futures and other commodity futures, interest rate futures, and the like. These are extremely risky and a good way to lose money.