Employment
It's been almost one year since my graduation from YorkU, and I have yet to put my english degree to good use (other than to write blog entries and fill out application forms). I have stayed in touch with a few fellow english grads and I am somewhat relieved to know that I'm not the only one struggling to kick start that career thing: some are working in glorious retail, others have sheltered themselves in further education, while others still are sleeping in and submitting the odd application in the afternoon. I -- for better or for worse -- generally belong in this latter group, although I technically have a part-time McJob.
It would be nice to make use of a university registry that would track the progress of all english grads and thereby help us get a clue on how to make some real money with this nicely framed degree. The Internet -- with its infinite ability to expose esoteric data -- does in fact provide us with a few accounts of successful english grads. Yes, that's not a typo: successful. However, their stories are often outdated and set in such an obscure geographical context as to make personal comparison practically impossible.
I am by no means desperate (yet) as I have a few potential opportunities lined up for 2007, but I am beginning to believe that our economy has very little tolerance for those maligned english grads who do not care for teaching, law, or writing the next great novel.
In any event, I have looked into technical writing, communications, and many other miscellaneous positions. How about you guys? Anybody else out there having some trouble finding a respectable job with an Arts degree? I would appreciate hearing your story and perhaps our discussion will help generate some positive ideas.
Cheers!
2 comments:
Thanks for the comments on the blog first off.
Second, after reading your entry I can see that you're describing the great realization of a whole bunch of us with the Arts degrees.
Unfortunately it would seem that we are facing an uphill battle with those, primarily because the degrees seem structured to only reach their full potential with the addition of... another degree.
So basically a BA isn't good enough, we need an MA and in some cases a PhD to make decent use of it. The only exception I've found being if you happen to have a fair amount of job experience which allows you some advancement beyond the stack of bad entry-level jobs.
I don't regret taking my history degree at all. It was fun and the people in the department were great, I just wish somebody had mentioned the difficulty in getting decent work beforehand so I could have spent some time working those crummy jobs earlier and getting that job experience instead of being a student the whole time.
Considering the abundance of employment-free time available to most Arts grads, we should all come down to Queen's Park with degrees in hand and protest our struggles. The event can double as a networking opportunity!
It's true that the B.A. has become nothing more than a (small) component of a larger whole. It's like getting a remote without the tv: we know where we want to go, we just lack the skills/further education/experience which can deliver us there.
I don't regret taking my English degree either; I sailed through my studies with few problems, and I met many interesting people along the way. What I do regret is not "developing a viable network of future employment contacts" -- I hope that I can be forgiven for not exploiting my friends like I was supposed to do.
That being said, I'm sure that brighter days are ahead for most of us.
And for all those in favour of storming Queen's Park: don't forget to put your precious Arts degrees into plastic sheaths so they can be safe from the pepper spray!
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