<p>^lol, that’s adorable!</p>
<p>From what I can see as the parent of just one film grad:</p>
<p>Some graduates who majored in directing or screenwriting (ATL) get lowpaid work as Production Assistants on films, but with schedules of 12-14 hours on set and their own domestic lives to maintain, they find it hard to pursue their own projects. There is no “spare time.” It’s entirely different from college life. The most hardworking, eager PA’s can rise hierarchically upwards on set into more responsibility writing or directing small parts of scenes, after a few years (NOT a few weeks or months) tp gain trust and contacts. Sometimes there’s crossover into TV.</p>
<p>Other grads take the jobs you imagine - waiting tables, working in bookstores - but need to be diligent and keep up their peer contacts from school to keep abreast of the industry. Their goal is to work survival jobs for rent, so they have maximum spare time to work on film type projects. They also have to endure the sneers of some who think they’ve failed because they’re waiting tables with a college degree (they haven’t failed, so if they sneer back, that’s why). </p>
<p>Others go home to work in their parent’s business selling widgets forever, but had the joy of majoring in film production. As future investors in film, with a college degree and understanding of all it takes to assemble a film, those graduates are also involved, but differently.</p>
<p>To keep traction after graduation requires core inner strength, and moral support/leads/contacts from peers placed elsewhere in the industry-- but some have just that. Personally I believe it takes a good 10 years of dues-paying in some form, in any creative industry. Parents who look at new or recent graduates with a one-year calendar in hand and anxious eyes on their wristwatch are not being fair to the situation. Give it time.</p>