<p>I am getting a lot of rude comments from people about my son not being able to find summer work. They make it sound so easy, as if he didn’t get any REUs or research positions because he applied too late. PUHLEASE! He applied plenty early. He hounded his professors to get their LORs in on time. When following up with emails when no response, he was told 300 people applied to positions accepting only 20. It is not just a matter of being early! </p>
<p>There are a lot of other factors involved, too, like demographics. Some programs have quotas to fill, and if you can’t check off the right box, no matter how qualified you are, you won’t get the job.</p>
<p>As we were leaving son’s dorm, he mentioned to his friend that he was hoping to find a position in the boy’s hometown, which has a lot of industry in his field of study. The boy said, Oh, yes, I got a job there, my neighbor works there, and he just put me right in. So, even though my son applied for similar jobs before this young man did, he wasn’t at the right place at the right time. </p>
<p>A lot of finding a job is footwork. If you don’t live in an area with industry, your chances are slim of finding an internship. And if you don’t know somebody who already works there, like your parent or neighbor, they’re pretty slim, too.</p>
<p>My husband actually works in a nontechnical department of a large company. There are two interns working with him this summer. Both are either children of or neighbors of people already working there. And at least one was there last summer as well. Son has applied to the technical departments of his company, all over the country now, but started with the city nearest his college. Still no luck.</p>
<p>Working on campus is better than nothing, to be sure. However, D did that last summer and had to spend more than half of what she earned on housing and food. She cooked for herself and lived in a dorm room, but the school she attends is in a very high rent area so the room cost $2800.</p>
<p>And yes, I’m getting a little tired of the rude comments myself, especially from people whose kids got their jobs through connections. D did not start late. She has been applying to several jobs each week since January, and before that in the fall she attended all the relevant resume drops and career fairs on campus and went through the interviews which resulted. Could she have done more? Sure she could have, but as it is the job search is taking too much time away from her studies and she’s doing the worst she’s done since she started college.</p>
<p>I asked my DS where he got his students to tutor. His response: Craigslist. He posted an ad. Tutored chemistry and physics. </p>
<p>I agree with mommusic. Several of the posts are simply either inaccurate or irrelevant to the topic. It is simply not true that one can “just sign up” for summer school. And it is really difficult to believe that there is not a single way to volunteer one’s time or energy. Bad advice is not helpful.</p>
<p>Another suggestion which might work for go-getters in cities–check out taskrabbit. It’s a website where people with teeny little one-off jobs (e.g. “Stand in line at apple store on such-and-such date for me” or “assemble my new Ikea stuff”) get bids on various tasks. </p>
<p>D1 has been looking for a few weeks now. It’s a frustrating experience, for sure.</p>
<p>My D tutored during the school year. If you are in the position to do it, it is good money for the amount of time involved. When there is a successful experience with one pupil word of mouth can come into play. I have heard of past high school teachers passing on a tutor’s name when they have a student who needs a little help.</p>
<p>D’s favorite job of all time was the summer before med school when she worked as a field hand on an organic farm. She worked like a dog, got the tan of her life and learned a ton about nutrition. She could write a book about the care and nurturing of organic chard. The kicker was that she had to apply in February to be assured of a job beginning each day at 5:30 or 6:00 am and requiring backbreaking physical labor. It’s tough out there. Best of luck to everyone looking.</p>
Ignore the rude comments. It can certainly be tough to get paid internships, or jobs with really good experiences. There are no guarantees.</p>
<p>On the other hand, if your son doesn’t have any kind of job - restaurant, landscaping, lifeguard, camp counseling, whatever - well, that would be a different matter. Those jobs are there for the asking. In my house, it would be time for “an agonizing reappraisal of the entire situation.”</p>
<p>Elleneast,
I wear my postcount as a badge of honor , not that it matters. Not sure why it was brought into the discussion, and there are many others with far higher postcounts than mine, and who have done so in a far shorter time on CC.</p>
<p>While I was with another friend yesterday I asked if her D would be working at a museum this year (as part of a teen program that she has done for 2 years). Her D instead decided to design her won jewelry and will be going to local craft fairs, etc. Her D wants to work in fashion, so I thought it was a great way to make some money and learn what it takes to rn her own business. Certainly not a plan for everyone, but I hope it works for her.</p>
<p>Oh, really? In what universe? Not around here. Kids I know haven’t been able to get restaurant jobs if the don’t have prior experience waiting tables. Kids I know who have worked for landscapers only got the job because a relative owned the company, then they were unable to get even reasonable part-time hours through the summer, basically being laid off because of lack of demand. Retail jobs tend to be predicated on looks, and most kids can’t get them. There are very, very few lifeguard jobs here, and you have to be certified anyway. Camp counselor jobs usually go to kids who have gone to the camp in question, who actually pay to be junior counselors for a year first. The holes to be filled in normally require some very specific area of expertise, such as the ability to teach tennis.</p>
<p>I do know kids who have jobs, but most of them are menial, low paid jobs that they started in HS and clung to (scooping ice cream, manning a food cart in Freeport, etc). Those with “better” jobs? Every single one is working for a relative or through a relative’s connections.</p>
<p>I know kids here who have actually stayed in their college town in another state because they consistently found it impossible to get a decent amount of work throughout the summer, despite their best efforts. And, of course, there is no public transportation, a significantly complicating factor.</p>
<p>OP - Tell your son to keep looking. The easier way to look for summer job is to check the job postings on the campus. He still has one more month to check out campus job bulletin board. If he lives near campus during the summer then he should go to check it often. I got my intership job after one month out of school and it paid very well. I was on the quarter system too. My son just got an intership interview less than two weeks ago (after some unsuccessfull interviews) and he will start the job next week. And it pays a lot more than other jobs he applied for.</p>
<p>The residue (or in some places the continuation) of a recession is leaving many very qualified, well educated adults without jobs. In our area, there are many tourist-oriented positions, but I would have to say that college kids are vying with their friends’ parents for some of the spots!</p>
<p>If our kids don’t have jobs or useful things to do this summer, I think the best path might be, as some have suggested, coming up with something creative and/or entrepreneurial. </p>
<p>Some schools- I don’t know how many - provide work study jobs through the financial aid office, by giving grants to employers who employ students. I didn’t know about this until recently and it may be rare, but doesn’t hurt to mention.</p>
<p>I hesitate to post for fear of reprisal, but in the CC spirit of sharing information, here goes:</p>
<p>D started her internship at my office. I can’t afford to pay her, but she is learning how to work with minimal supervision, and do research on the marketing task we have given her (how to use FB to increase our natural traffic). Next summer, if she still can’t find a job, I will put her on commission, and see if she can be a good sales assistant. </p>
<p>I told her about signing up for a temp agency (good advice I got from this thread). She said she would look into that, and she told me about a site called: barefootstudent. Basically you post your resume or skill set and availability, and employers contact you.</p>
<p>I think back to the summer between my freshman and sophomore year. I returned home, with no plans, and no job. My parents were consumed by caring for my younger sister, who was quite ill. I called some employment ads, got nowhere, then walked around a department store in the heart of my dead and dying rust belt city, where there were no jobs. I saw that they had a snack bar that closed at 3. I asked to speak to the manager, and I said something like “if you can keep it open later especially on Thursdays when you’re already open late you could keep more customers in the store”. The manager said he didn’t need me here, but they might need someone in the deli. Turns out a woman there had just announced she couldn’t be on her feet all the time, so I got hired part time, which became full time. I sliced tomatoes, made sandwiches, and cleaned the big meat slicer. And I got a store discount, which made everything seem really affordable, so I saved nothing, but I learned a lesson which still holds true today: not all jobs are advertised. Sometimes you just have to go up to someone (maybe someone who’s been pulling weeds and putting down mulch all day), and say you would be willing to do that job if they’ll pay you.</p>
<p>My kids have been on all sides of this, and sometimes you just run out of ideas. S has his old out of town resort job this summer. He wanted to stay in town, but he didn’t want to have nothing. D got out from school early and had pretty easy pickings. But now that what she picked isn’t working out, I think she’s in trouble. Timing seems to be the main thing, around here at least. Now is awful, and it will only get worse for the next month. We’ve found that jobs are easier to come by again in August. Unfortunately, she desperately needs to make money in June and July, so she will definitely need to get creative.</p>
<p>I think the hardest (for us at least) is when planned jobs don’t happen for whatever reason. S was devastated a few summers back when the cool museum job he had fell through at the last minute, and he was stuck in June with no plans and no job. After the long humbling experiences applying and getting rejected for the worst jobs possible (KFC fryer…) he got a lifeguard certification and then temped at a retail job that he sees as one of his most useful work experiences ever. He has gotten a number of lifeguard jobs since, so it worked out. But it is tough, and you need to think outside the box.</p>
<p>I’d suggest your S consider asking to volunteer or shadow someone doing something he is thinking about doing when he graduates. This will give him exposure about what that job would entail and help him decide whether it’s the path he REALLY wants to take, saving a lot of questioning and possibly grief later. This option is greatly underutilized and can lead to a job down the road if he likes it & they like him.</p>
<p>Our D also doesn’t have any job lined up nor internship. We hope she will do some volunteering & shadowing, whether or not she is paid so she can have a better idea of what she will be doing when she gets her degree next spring & makes valuable contacts in our community.</p>
<p>Just spoke to a neighbor whose S graduated from a well-known Southern U. The S has a summer job waiting tables at an inn where the kids make $150-200 per shift in tips. Other than that, he is looking. One kid seems to have a job with Teach for America. One kid has some kind of job in his field (architecture, Penn). My kid is in Europe with a combination of fellowship/summer job. He is very lucky.</p>
<p>Thankfully my son’s on campus job includes a dorm room and one meal a day. It’s a better job than any of his friends have who came home so I think he made the right call. (Most of them are working though one is doing telemarketing and may not stick with it.)</p>
<p>My older son had an internship canceled on him the summer after the 2008 meltdown. Thankfully the Carnegie Mellon grapevine found him an internship, but it was very last minute. Big relief when it came through.</p>
<p>I think our kids need to have a broad definition of “job”. During the school year, D had signed up to volunteer to get people to register to vote. Apparently, this group goes around to kids at concerts and encourages them to register. D got asked to work at a concert, which she did a few weekends ago – 2 6 hour shifts, one Saturday, one Sunday.</p>
<p>Did she get a paycheck? No. Did she get something valuable in return for her labor? Absolutely – free parking, a lunch voucher, and the chance to stay once her shift was done and see the concert for free.</p>
<p>Your D is also providing a public service of helping engage peers in the political process & will have something to add to her resume. Good for her!</p>
, not that it matters. Not sure why it was brought into the discussion, and there are many others with far higher postcounts than mine, and who have done so in a far shorter time on CC.</p>