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

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My wife graduated in 2010 with a degree in English from University of Virginia with ZERO experience and never had a job in her life. She took off one semester in her senior year and attended as many technology conferences as she could even though she knew nothing about technologies other than powering on/off her Apple macbook. Many of the conferences let her in free of charge, I guess because of her good look, and she made her "networking" there. At one of those conferences, she met my mother, who was an SES in the federal government at the time, over lunch and they quickly became friends. My now wife told my mother that she was looking for a job so my mother picked up the phone and called one of the government contractors that reported to her and asked them if they were willing to hire someone with an English major for technical writing documentation. They of course said yes and paid her a salary of 80K per year. When my mother left the government for the private sector, she took my now wife with her and promoted her to Technical Project Manager (TPM) and her salary went from 90K to 150K. I met my wife at my mother's Christmas party and the rest is history. My wife is now a SVP at a F500 company through one of my mother's friends. It is about connections. YMMV.

The point here is that technology companies need English majors too, not just Engineering and CS. OP's kid needs to go to technology conferences and meet people and it will definitely help. He/she only needs one person to say yes and go from there. Most of the time, it is the English major people that do well in technology companies. Someone needs to manage those tech people.

This is the most important post of the entire thread. Share this with your daughter.

Since you daughter is already bringing in a large sum tutoring she should look less at pay being offered and more about how she would like working for each employer. She can still do tutoring as side work.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My sister works in tech and the hiring is pretty tight these days.

There is always a bull market somewhere in tech...right now it is Machine Learning Engineers and the AI folks if you have any skills.

Know a recent grad in this sector, not happy, hoping to stick it out until vested, but that’s 5 years and what goes up can came down

Sounds employed, though...yes? I assume OP would be ecstatic for their kid to be complaining about their highly-paid ML job.

Just pushing back on *bull market somewhere in tech* when highly qualified grads feel trapped in place, tech hiring is lean.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My sister works in tech and the hiring is pretty tight these days.

There is always a bull market somewhere in tech...right now it is Machine Learning Engineers and the AI folks if you have any skills.

Know a recent grad in this sector, not happy, hoping to stick it out until vested, but that’s 5 years and what goes up can came down

Sounds employed, though...yes? I assume OP would be ecstatic for their kid to be complaining about their highly-paid ML job.

Just pushing back on *bull market somewhere in tech* when highly qualified grads feel trapped in place, tech hiring is lean.

That’s odd. My kid is out in SFO in AI and literally is offered jobs constantly. He said it is definitely boom times right now.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think anyone on this thread is actually an English major. Plenty of us are out there and do very well

Im philosophy not English, but the same category. When I started, companies, including the one I work for, were very willing to train. Now they all seem to want either experience or technical skill. The training program that I was initially hired into is still there but it’s laughably small now.

[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.

your kid made college a fun hobby. why would you pay that for an English degree? just read a bunch of books from the public library. you don’t need an english degree to come out with the same result.

[Anonymous]

My niece is one of those "expensive" kids. Her parents paid a fortune for her to go to U of Michigan Business school. Majored in Finance. Cannot keep a job. Every few months she is either let go or fired. My sister is heavily in debt because of her.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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.

your kid made college a fun hobby. why would you pay that for an English degree? just read a bunch of books from the public library. you don’t need an english degree to come out with the same result.

You obviously neither have an English degree nor understand the value of one.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My niece is one of those "expensive" kids. Her parents paid a fortune for her to go to U of Michigan Business school. Majored in Finance. Cannot keep a job. Every few months she is either let go or fired. My sister is heavily in debt because of her.

What a shame; she has a good degree from a great college. Do you know why she can’t keep a job? Hopefully she will get a dose of maturity quickly.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My niece is one of those "expensive" kids. Her parents paid a fortune for her to go to U of Michigan Business school. Majored in Finance. Cannot keep a job. Every few months she is either let go or fired. My sister is heavily in debt because of her.

What a shame; she has a good degree from a great college. Do you know why she can’t keep a job? Hopefully she will get a dose of maturity quickly.

Because she doesn't understand when she needs to shut up and listen. I work in Finance and I witnessed her interactions with her superiors. She is oozing anxiety and at the same time, arrogance and "know it all" attitude. She tries to suck up to people and they are uncomfortable. I tried giving her pointers only to be rebuffed and scolded by my sister "ooh, you are adding to her anxiety". FWIW, my DD went to a state school, got degree in accounting and had the same job for the past 3 years that is now paying for her masters. I used her college fund as a downpayment for HER condo. My niece still lives with her parents.

[Anonymous]

Get an internship or fellowship at a place they would want to work. Or get a more specialized masters

[Anonymous]

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

No, kid should hold out for an upper management position. Big multinationals are always looking for English majors with no experience to put in charge of big portions of their operations.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

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?

First of all, this is not a "red flag." Do you even know what that phrase means?

Second, why should someone have to work for next to nothing just to "pay their dues"? I'm not sure why we expect our young adults to work for free or next to nothing and not understand why they aren't getting married, buying homes, having kids, etc. These are prime working years and they should earn a living wage to have some of those things.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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.

your kid made college a fun hobby. why would you pay that for an English degree? just read a bunch of books from the public library. you don’t need an english degree to come out with the same result.

You obviously neither have an English degree nor understand the value of one.

There is no value. Check the stats the colleges all track by major and then employment 3 months out and average income. English is abysmal. But hey a good hobby!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I don’t think anyone on this thread is actually an English major. Plenty of us are out there and do very well

Im philosophy not English, but the same category. When I started, companies, including the one I work for, were very willing to train. Now they all seem to want either experience or technical skill. The training program that I was initially hired into is still there but it’s laughably small now.

Why not major in something that trains you , it's not a summer camp it's college moron

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

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.

your kid made college a fun hobby. why would you pay that for an English degree? just read a bunch of books from the public library. you don’t need an english degree to come out with the same result.

You obviously neither have an English degree nor understand the value of one.

There is no value. Check the stats the colleges all track by major and then employment 3 months out and average income. English is abysmal. But hey a good hobby!

Why would you major in a language you speak natively. It's like majoring on how to take dump