Graduating During the Pandemic
Grasping for Hope in a Seemingly Hopeless Job Market
I still remember it like it was yesterday; I had just received an email from the school notifying us that all classes were now canceled and would be moved to online only for the foreseeable future. This was about a week after WHO just declared COVID-19 a pandemic on March 11, 2020.
I’ll admit, at first, I wasn’t too concerned about COVID-19. If history was a teacher, with the past H1N1, or swine flu pandemic, it was pretty much over by the time summer came around. Therefore, at the time, I reasoned that this COVID-19 thing would be over by the time summer came around and I could enjoy my 5th year since that year would be my last year of university.
You might as well have sent me the above meme because boy was I so wrong. The virus didn’t go away; in fact, it was infecting people left and right, and my hopes for having that fun 5th year were all but dashed. Fast-forward to my last spring semester, we still were holding all the classes online, and all internship opportunities were pretty much non-existent. I remember for my capstone class, I had to obtain an internship, which I failed to do since the majority of the internships that were supposed to be available weren’t since they required us to meet in person.
Luckily, that class was lenient on me so in the end, I just had to provide proof of a part-time job instead that was (sort of) aligned with my major, which was human developmental psychology. (In case you guys were wondering, I was a caregiver.)
As graduation crept closer and closer, I was scrambling to find potential full-time jobs, since the job market at that time was barely recovering but was not substantial enough to warrant a significant difference.
I would’ve continued to transition full-time at my current part-time position, but unfortunately, they didn’t have any full-time openings. No surprise there given the job market. 3 months after I graduated, I was able to finally land a full-time job at a radiology clinic by stopping by a job fair I found out about while getting my knees X-Rayed. Although the pay was only slightly higher than what I had, I still took it given that it was a full-time position with benefits.
During the 90 days I was searching for a full-time position, I sent hundreds of applications, only landing 1–2 interviews the following week, which was a far cry from my usual ratio of sending 30–40 applications and landing 4–5 interviews the following week.
I’ll be honest, my story is actually one of the lucky ones since there were many factors that did contribute to my being able to find full-time work in just 3 months, such as networking around, job fairs, always updating my LinkedIn profile, etc. I’ve had peers who weren’t able to land anything for at least 7 months. For some, it took them at least a year to find anything substantial. Others have had their job offers rescinded when the pandemic hit, despite going through and completing the entire job process. Not exactly the most encouraging circumstances for a fresh grad out of uni.
I guess what I can really take away from this experience, is that networking is a big help, having a good LinkedIn profile is key, job fairs are a great way to get your foot in the door, having an ongoing income source is key, and that no matter how bleak the market is, there’s always hope.
Liked this story? Consider buying me a boba!
