|
|
 |
Job-Searching College Seniors Worry About Economy
Produced by Stephanie Lecci on Thursday, March 20, 2008
|
|
AP Photo/Al Goldis |
Worries over the job market are fueling speculation that the economy is headed for recession. Recently the government reported that employers cut 63,000 jobs in February, the biggest drop since 2003. For many college students who will soon join the job market, the situation seems bleak. As part of our Economy Hits Home series, Stephanie Lecci has the story of two college seniors trying to find jobs.
DePaul University senior Mike Kueker has been planning his career options for more than a year with advisor Melanie Murray. In early March, the finance major told her he had good leads at two organizations he’s interned with, one of the big four accounting firms in Chicago and a government agency.
MURRAY: When do you feel these companies are gonna give offers? Have they actually talked about it during your internship?
KUEKER: Neither one has in black and white, you have an offer, but the language has been very positive so far.
MURRAY: Okay, well that’s good to hear.
At the time, Kueker said he felt confident that the industry he’s pursuing wouldn’t be that affected by an economic downturn. But his internship at the accounting firm ended last Friday—without an offer.
KUEKER: Our group was very economically sensitive to, you know, if our clients aren’t making business, then we can’t really be doing business for them, so the reason they told me is that economically, they couldn’t hire me.
Now he says he’s a little less confident. And he joins the ranks of many other students seen by Melanie Murray, who’s the Career Center specialist for DePaul’s College of Commerce.
MURRAY: Ninety percent of students I’m meeting with right now are very concerned. We’re reaching graduation in June, some are actually graduating in two weeks here in DePaul in March. So they’re very scared. A lot of the finance majors are because of the banking industries had some layoffs and mergers, and so they’re feeling that that’s affecting their employment possibilities.
The numbers aren’t terrible. A new report from the National Association of Colleges and Employers shows employers plan to hire 8 percent more new college graduates in 2008 than they did last year. But last fall, the projection was twice that much. And the national jobless rate has increased significantly since last year. About 544,000 more people were unemployed this February than at the same time last year.
It’s enough to make Amanda Taubman spend several hours a week writing cover letters and sending out job applications.
TAUBMAN: So I was just trying to use, I want to say, moreso like industry buzz words, language that’s common throughout advertising.
Taubman is a communications senior at DePaul and wants to go into advertising. Like others in her major, she’s just now beginning her job search. But so far, she doesn’t like what she’s hearing.
TAUBMAN: Talking to HR people and recruiters, they’ve said basically, we’re just not hiring as many people each month. So to me that’s evidence that the job market is only going to get tougher as the months go on.
Taubman doesn’t seem like the kind of candidate who needs to be concerned about having a job come graduation. She’s done 3 internships, including one at a major Chicago communications agency, and she’s a peer advisor at DePaul’s Career Center. But she says she thinks about getting a job every day.
TAUBMAN: When I wake up in the morning I always have a goal of writing cover letter and then send out an application. So it’s become almost like another class this quarter, and I think that that’s going to continue throughout spring, and it just takes up a tremendous amount of time.
Taubman says it'll be worth it if she gets a job she's passionate about. She says the worst case scenario is she still won’t find a job even after her June graduation. If that happens, she says she might have to take a job in an unrelated field that she doesn’t really want. It’s an option Mike Kueker, the finance major, might have to consider as well. He says he’d be a lot more stressed if he didn’t have the job lead at the government agency.
KUEKER: I wouldn’t go so far as to say that I thought I was recession-proof or anything, but I guess I thought that if we did have one, that I wouldn’t be in a position where I’d be hurting, I guess. Now that, you know, they told me I haven’t gotten a position because of the economy, it makes me a little more unsettled and a little more concerned.
He’ll find out soon whether he’ll get a firm offer from the agency. And if he doesn’t get that position, he’ll join Taubman in the job hunt.
|
|