Any parents out there who paid $200K+ for college, kid did great, and now can't find job?

[Anonymous]

Any parents out there who paid $200K+ for college, kid did great, and now can't find job?
Kid graduated from top 20/30 school with honors and career center was completely worthless.

[Anonymous]

What did kid major in? What does kid want to do?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Any parents out there who paid $200K+ for college, kid did great, and now can't find job?
Kid graduated from top 20/30 school with honors and career center was completely worthless.

Come on don’t blame the “career center.” Finding first jobs can happen quickly or take a while, obviously, depending on the industry and the approach that someone takes to jobhunting. Colleges have resources, but they’re certainly not responsible for handing anyone a job.

[Anonymous]

OP you should be grateful your kid doesn’t have school loans to pay off. You sound entitled to criticize the career center. Nobody owes your kid a job.

This situation is exactly why there’s a higher education crisis.

Imagine having 6 figure debt and applying to Starbucks because it’s better than nothing. Usually families like yours were insulated from this reality. Not anymore. You know all those articles about how young people aren’t saving, buying houses or having kids? Now you’re getting a glimpse into why.

[Anonymous]

Unless / until shares what the major was, the post is worthless.

[Anonymous]

OP here - major was English -- a beautiful major. The world needs more English majors.... especially from schools well known for their English & humanities departments. That should translate into many jobs in media, publishing, etc. And yes, with what we paid, no guarantees, but I would expect better assistance from the career center. The kid has worked so hard looking for a job and is not willing to be underemployed.

I appreciate the tecchies, but not everyone is made to do that work. The world needs some fuzzies, too. More than ever actually.

BTW - middle class burb family that has worked hard for it.

[Anonymous]

I feel like internships are what lead to jobs either at that company or another one.
I do have a friend who paid $75-80k/year for a prestigious private NE college for a psychology degree and for the first 2 years afterward the kid has been making $40-50k, initially at a sales/customer service type job.

[Anonymous]

They need a masters and to go teach.

[Anonymous]

I think most top colleges have really strong career centers, for every major, but you have to go to them, they're not coming to find you

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here - major was English -- a beautiful major. The world needs more English majors.... especially from schools well known for their English & humanities departments. That should translate into many jobs in media, publishing, etc. And yes, with what we paid, no guarantees, but I would expect better assistance from the career center. The kid has worked so hard looking for a job and is not willing to be underemployed.

I appreciate the tecchies, but not everyone is made to do that work. The world needs some fuzzies, too. More than ever actually.

BTW - middle class burb family that has worked hard for it.

This seems like a small red flag to me? What do you mean that your child does not want to be "underemployed"? Everyone should pay their dues and those dues can really stink sometimes. But they get your foot in the door and more times than not, lead to very good things.

Did your child have any internships? What did they do to network over their breaks and summers prior to graduation?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here - major was English -- a beautiful major. The world needs more English majors.... especially from schools well known for their English & humanities departments. That should translate into many jobs in media, publishing, etc. And yes, with what we paid, no guarantees, but I would expect better assistance from the career center. The kid has worked so hard looking for a job and is not willing to be underemployed.

I appreciate the tecchies, but not everyone is made to do that work. The world needs some fuzzies, too. More than ever actually.

BTW - middle class burb family that has worked hard for it.

Maybe that’s the problem? What does underemployed mean for the holder of an English degree?

[Anonymous]

Not willing to be underemployed... ?
That's the problem right there.

[Anonymous]

The kid needs to take a PT job and parlay it into FT, either at the same place, or by taking it up on resume and in future interviews

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:OP here - major was English -- a beautiful major. The world needs more English majors.... especially from schools well known for their English & humanities departments. That should translate into many jobs in media, publishing, etc. And yes, with what we paid, no guarantees, but I would expect better assistance from the career center. The kid has worked so hard looking for a job and is not willing to be underemployed.

I appreciate the tecchies, but not everyone is made to do that work. The world needs some fuzzies, too. More than ever actually.

BTW - middle class burb family that has worked hard for it.

I was an English major at a top 20 college. I worked as a temp for a while, then eventually transitioned to technical project management (no programming skills required, just knowledge of systems and processes).

[Anonymous]

Not working is not a good plan. Take a job, any job, do well and work your way up. Also, lots of kids end up going to grad school to become more marketable.