Are Graduates Finding Jobs?

CountingDown
Thu, 18 Jun 2009 20:40:24 +0000

S1 was very fortunate to land a research/programming gig in Boston with a prof whose work he greatly admires. Got the offer last October and we have held our collective breath waiting to see what would happen. The prof’s funding came through before the economy crashed, so he is now working! It pays for his summer rent, expenses, and he’ll be able to save enough to cover all of his books/personal expenses for next year.

He’s a math major but with serious programming skills. I think he has finally seen the light that the programming can help him pay the bills in tough times (including during grad school).

I finished school during the recession in the early 80s and started with a temp agency while looking for journalism jobs. Got an offer from a big mutual fund where I was temping, it paid the same crummy $$ as entry-level journalism, and I took the leap into pension administration/communications. There are lots of jobs that even new college grads have never considered – it’s not like I set out to be a 401(k) administrator when I was a polisci/journalism major!