Jobs After College: The Problem of Unemployment

Introduction

Statistics indicate that the unemployment rate in the United States stood at 4%, while the fresh college graduates accounted for 2.2% in the year 2017. Most of the graduates get out of the colleges with high hopes of securing a white color job. What most of these college students especially those still in college do not know is that after they graduate and get out in the real world, they will be competing for job opportunities. Finding a job then becomes harder than expected. Hence, this necessitates the need for intervention from all the education stakeholders to reduce the rate of unemployment for the fresh graduates across the US. Therefore, the paper will identify the rising unemployment of freshly graduated students as one of the current problems through the establishment of the major causes and establish measures that can be utilized to curb the menace.

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The Problem

The job seeking has over the time become a tedious process leaving most of the graduates frustrated in the long run. A survey conducted in the years 2013 and 2013, indicate that the number of students graduating from colleges in America constitutes of the following; approximately 900,000 held associate degrees and about 1.8 million graduated with bachelor's degrees (Davidescu and Ion 13). The study reveals that more than 40% of these graduates go without a job for the first six months or more. The menace is worsening due to the low exposure is given to these students on the act of job-seeking. Therefore, the lack of such competencies has subjected such graduates into an extended period without acquiring permanent occupations. This explains the current situation where the number of fresh jobless graduates is constantly increasing as time pass.

Additionally, institutions have concentrated on academic performance and have failed to prepare the students for life after college. According to Bezerra, et al. 707, there are several opportunities in the economy, and the universities ought to co-operate with the local organizations and businesses to instill the entrepreneurial spirit, which is not being practiced in the colleges. The study has identified that most of the schools are primarily interested in teaching these students the coursework and in turn, ignore the important lesson that aims at introducing them to the application of their knowledge in the real world. Therefore, the education system presents leakages, where the graduates rely on corporates for them to acquire employment, rather than looking for alternatives through the application of the knowledge acquired from their academic life.

Notably, the students are rigid and do not advance their skills to fit the current requirements of the job market. The current employees are no longer concerned with the grates an individual has scored during his or her course study. Rather, they are constantly searching for unique skills and abilities (Kumpikaite-Valiuniene et al. 197). Students assume that going to college or university is an assurance that they will 'automatically' land good-paying jobs after they graduate. But that is not the case. Hence, the students who are released into the job market are irrelevant and cannot deliver relevant needs of the employers in the market. This result to most of such students going for months and years before they can acquire a stable job opportunity. Hence, the notion that after graduation, landing a job opportunity will be easy should be erased entirely from their expectations since it has led to most of them relaxing and waiting for graduation rather than aiming at equipping themselves with relevant skills and competencies.

Additionally, the underperformance of firms in the united states has reduced the availability of job opportunities in the US. The nation has still to recover from the financial crisis of 2008, which means that the organizations in the country are still struggling to achieve their optimal profitability. Hence, according to Cullen 1, the downturn of the business performance and enterprises has been one of the major cause of increment in the rate of unemployment. Hence, this has also reduced the success rate of the fresh graduates who are solely relying on formal employment as their primary source of income.

Solution to the Unemployment Menace

The institutions ought to introduce leadership and mentoring programs in the college and university curriculum. The program will assist in helping and preparing graduates for the life after they graduate. Additionally, the knowledge acquired from such programs will assist the students to diversify their mind and have widened source of potential sources of income (Zimbroff et al.). The scheme will also prepare the students for the challenges that they will face in the modern-day job market as a beginner. Therefore, the program is primarily meant to change the mindset of these young undergraduates even as they prepare to leave campus and begin their new lives. This will expose them to a vast pool of potential money-making ventures.

Additionally, the government ought to introduce entrepreneurship lessons and foster local partnerships between the institutions to equip the students with enterprising skills. The move will ensure that the students will reduce their reliance on corporate jobs and engage in entrepreneurship projects such as the formation of student spin-off organizations to enhance youth entrepreneurship (Bezerra et al. 715). Such a program would be suitable for the students in their senior year in college, which would encourage the students to engage in other money-making activities and the process reduces the demand of the corporate jobs in the economy (Zimbroff, Andrew, et al.). Hence, this will ensure that the students that initially remained jobless after graduating are involved in productive and profitable venture rather than remaining jobless for an extended period.

Notably, the curriculum should be updated to accommodate the needs and demands of the dynamic business environment. According to Cullen 1, the modern employers deal with evolving business environment, which requires new skills as time pass. Hence, the students ought to change their attitude towards work and aim at attaining the relevant skills and capabilities, which will let them be competitive in the current job market. Cullen 1 further states that the other aspects such as intrinsic motivation, and positive attitude towards work are some of the employers and manager seeks from the potential employees. Hence, individuals who possess such features will increase their chances of securing employment immediately after graduating from college. This move ensures that the students are equipped with the job market requirement and ensure that they are competitive thus reducing the rates of unemployment for the fresh graduates.

Conclusion

The paper has identified the rising unemployment of freshly graduated students as one of the current problems through the establishment of the major causes and established measures that can be utilized to curb the menace. For instance, the job seeking has over the time become tedious, leaving more than 40% of the graduates jobless. Additionally, the failure of the colleges to prepare the students for life after college has forced them to become rigid in their job searching process. Moreover, the underperformance of firms in the united states has reduced the availability of job opportunities in the US, thus reducing the employment opportunities. However, such a problem may be countered with solutions such as the introduction of leadership and mentoring programs in the college and university curriculum to expose the students to a wide pool of potential money-making ventures. Notably, the introduction of entrepreneurship lessons and fostering local partnerships between the institutions to equip the students with enterprising skills. And finally, the curriculum should be updated to accommodate the needs and demands of the dynamic business environment.

Works Cited

Bezerra, Eder D., Candido Borges, and Tales Andreassi. "Universities, local partnerships and the promotion of youth entrepreneurship." International Review of Education 63.5 (2017): 703-724.

Cullen, Erin. College graduates face uncertain job market: LABOR market. New Hampshire Business Review. 5/16/2003, Vol. 25 Issue 10, p1.

Davidescu, A. A., and Ion Dobre. "Revisiting the Relationship between Shadow Economy and the Level of Unemployment Rate. An SVAR Empirical Investigation for the Case of United States." Journal of Applied Quantitative Methods 8.3 (2013): 11-19.

Kumpikaite-Valiuniene, Vilmante, et al. "Students' Attitude to Job Performance: Intercultural Study." Engineering Economics27.2 (2016): 195-204.

Zimbroff, Andrew, et al. "Beyond lemonade stands to main street business development: A youth entrepreneurship curriculum." Journal of Extension 55.3 (2017).