Degree
not a guarantee
Daniel
Frias
After
four or five years -- depending on how smart
you are -- of writing essays, staying up
late, waking up early, attending countless
lectures and taking so many exams, the time
finally comes for you to get what you've
work so hard for and sacrificed so much
for your college degree.
I
like to think of a college degree as just
a piece of paper with your name on it. But
it's more than that. It's a reward for all
your hard work, it represents your college
education and, more importantly, it enables
you to get a better job and have a career.
Well,
it is supposed to anyway. Yet many recent
college grads complain that they can't find
a job in their field of study once they
earn their college degree. This may true,
but the problem is that they can't find
a job or that it's difficult to find one.
The problem is many grads don't want to
start at the bottom and work their way up.
They expect to have a corner office, have
high income or be in charge because they
have a college degree.
How
naïve. The real world doesn't work
that way. You have to start from the bottom.
You have to pay your dues, so to speak.
You have to prove you are capable of doing
the job. But, of course, this is difficult
to do when employers are not willing to
give you a chance to prove yourself.
Employers
do not want to hire college graduates because
the majority of them have very little or
no work experience in their field of study.
But how are you supposed to get experience
if they do not give you a chance to gain
that experience? It's a catch 22.
A
college degree does not guarantee you will
get a good job right out of college, but
it certainly gives you a better chance than
someone who does not have a degree. This
is difficult for many people to accept.
They feel, and have every right to, that
if they work hard and get a college degree
they should be able to find a job right
out of college.
Take
my cousin for instance. She just recently
graduated from Cal State Hayward with a
degree in graphic design, but was unable
to get a job even with her degree. The only
job she found, which she reluctantly accepted,
was as a cashier for a car dealership. Of
course she would rather be working in a
job that is related to graphic design, but
at 22, she has very little work experience.
This
may not be an ideal job for a college graduate,
but this job is better than no job at all.
My cousin is gaining work experience, which
is what employers look for and when the
economy recovers she will be able to find
a job that requires the use of her education.
Daniel
Frias is a journalism major at Cal State
Long Beach.
|
