The Endless Summer

Unemployment and Life After College


The month is May. You’ve finished finals and you’ve just spent the last week celebrating. Your family is in town and they’re cheering you on at graduation as you walk across the stage, a member of the class of 2009 and one of your university’s most recent alumni.

The month is June. You’re still reeling from the reality of graduating, despite it feeling like forever ago. You’ve spent the last few weeks traveling and detoxing from four years of papers, presentations, readings, and perhaps some partying. You’ve earned it.

The month is July. The 4th was a blast (no pun intended), but you still don’t have a job yet. You applied to some positions over the past 6 months but no call backs yet. A couple of standard, ‘thanks for applying’ emails, but not a single interview. ‘What’s the deal?’ you say to yourself. You were told since you were 5 years old that your bachelor’s degree would be your golden ticket. You figured you’d have a job upon graduation but that hasn’t seemed to happen yet. “How come I’m still jobless? Do I really deserve this? Is the economy that bad? Am I destined to flip burgers with my diploma?”

Unfortunately, this situation is all too real for a cohort of 2009 graduates whose graduation timing couldn’t have been worse. Even if you lived in a cave you’d still know about current market conditions – CNN would make sure of it. How, then, are a bunch of undergraduates supposed to get jobs when firms are laying people off to reduce overhead? More importantly, how are undergraduates supposed to get jobs that are only offered to people with a master’s degree and 5 years of experience? The answer: they aren’t. Many people saw this coming and either signed up for volunteer work, applied for Teach for America, or decided to go straight to graduate school or some other, non-occupational endeavor. But then there are the ones who didn’t; who either applied and tried to compete or simply didn’t apply at all. Some got jobs, most didn’t, and the ones who didn’t apply at least were aware of their inevitable unemployment beforehand.

In a time of economic insecurity, regime changes, and seemingly never-ending cover letter writing, my advice is this: stay persistent. As Shakespeare’s King Lear said: “Nothing will come of nothing.” The more you apply, the more chances you have at piquing someone’s interest. However, not applying, for whatever reason, is the same as not shooting during a game of basketball: you’re guaranteed to miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

So, in dealing with the whole situation, breaking down these giant challenges, that is, ‘getting a job’ and ‘what to do with my diploma,’ can make life a whole lot simpler. Set small goals. Achieve a little at a time. Because, in the end, that final result is comprised of a set of smaller, individual steps anyway, so why not aim in a general direction with a main goal in mind while plotting the smaller steps along the way as to eliminate the overwhelming feeling of bewilderment one feels when asking oneself “So what’s next?”

As always, your comments are welcome. Thank you.