Are there many people like me that have alot of college debt and currently cannot find a job in their chosen field? I am trying to do contract work and hope to find permanent work in the future. But I want to know if there are other young grads like myself in the midwest that have found themselves stuck. It is hard to get ahead with limited opp and large debt. Do you agree?
When you’ve got boatloads of debt, you can’t be picky about work. Take whatever job you can get for now, and keep looking for the permanent one in the chosen field.
My niece took a year to find a job. When she first graduated she did what she’d done for years -house sit, dog sit, worked as a hostess at a restaurant. Then about 4 months later she got a minimum wage job but for a sports team, so there was a lot of fun and a lot of overtime. About 10 months after graduation she just got a ‘real’ job. She moved to another city and found an apartment and is getting on with her life.
Don’t give up, it takes a little bit of time.
If your loans are federally funded loans (Direct, Perkins), you could apply for income based repayment. This would reduce your loan payments to a %age of your income. The one thing you want to do is be current on your loan payments, regardless of your income.
If you have private loans…there is no income based repayment.
What is your field and how narrowly have you defined your employment prospects?
I counsel kids all the time and it astonishes me that someone with a degree in Art History who wants to work in a museum doesn’t think that an entry level job at a historical society conducting tours for the public and doing social media/updating the website is a relevant “first job”- especially if it comes with full benefits.
What are you looking to do? There are likely related fields and jobs where you can launch. And are you looking beyond your own hometown/city??? You need to. If the job of your dreams is in Charlotte or Dallas, you need to move to Charlotte or Dallas. Absent a note from your doctor stating that your medical needs are too complex to be handled elsewhere, you need to cast a wide net.
This. ^ Good advice.
When I hear new graduates with a Bachelor’s, say they can’t find a job - no matter the major, humanities, STEM - it almost always turns out that they are only looking within a 50-mile radius of their hometown.
I have told my daughter, when you graduate and start the job-hunt, you must be ready and willing to be MOBILE.
Also - like blossom said - everyone has to start at the bottom. Everyone. Make sure you are looking for ENTRY-LEVEL jobs. And be flexible.
Perkins loans cannot be included in income driven repayment plans unless they are consolidated into a Direct Loan. Just wanted to point this out!
Here are some things that make new grads more marketable- regardless of their degree or what they want to do:
1- make sure your excel skills are top notch- and that you state that on your resume. Do a few tutorials on the internet if you are rusty.
2- make sure ALL your office skills are current. If you need to brush up on your powerpoint skills- do it.
3- make sure you have scrubbed your Facebook and other social media accounts so that photos of you falling down drunk at Mardi Gras or Spring break are gone. And if your email address is “partyguy@hotmail.com”, get yourself a business-ready gmail account.
4-Take off anything on your resume that doesn’t contribute. It’s an 8.5 by 11 inch piece of real estate and it’s too valuable to have your HS soccer championship taking up space unless you are applying to the national soccer league or want to be a HS athletic coach (in which case, you obviously keep it on).
5-prepare your elevator pitch and deliver it to every single employed person you see. Your dentist, Pastor/religious leader, the librarian. Even if you think that nobody in your lame hometown knows anyone- you’d be surprised. The principal of my kids elementary school has kept in touch with a student who graduated eons ago… who when one of my kids was looking for a job in DC happened to be a senior WH staffer. We were all shocked that with one phone call, the principal got a “happy to interview anyone you suggest” call back. (didn’t get the job- wrong political party at the time, but kid was mighty pleased to have the opportunity!)
6- Make sure you are applying for both the job you REALLY want as well as everything else in its orbit. What does that mean? If you are interested in marketing, you need experience in marketing regardless of where it comes from. So if you want to work at an ad agency, that also means applying for entry level roles at the Red Cross (they advertise), the big insurance company which has headquarters in your town (they advertise), etc. Draw a circle around the job you want (metaphorically) and do your job search in a 360 degree way. Every kid who wants to work in sports management thinks that means running the NFL or developing schedules for ESPN.
yes- eventually. But for now it might mean a job at the local sports arena doing promotional work, or a sporting goods company working on their blog and website.
What did you get your degree in? What was your career goal? How much debt do you have and is it all fed? or is some private or Plus?
If some is Plus, I don’t think it can be IBR if based on student income since it’s parent debt. I don’t think IBR is available for private loans…and likely those would be co-signed anyway.
Stafford/Direct/Perkins loans do have IBR, but I don’t know what the lowest IBR payment would be for an unemployed person. Anyone know?
As for getting a job…at this point, if you can’t find a job in your field, broaden your horizons. I was surprised to learn how much a good sales person at an AT&T store can earn…more than $55k…and as much as $90k…with great benefits.
You can always take any job in the meantime just to have income coming in while still looking for a job in your field. When you’re completely unemployed, it can be harder to get the job you want.
A good sales person ANYWHERE makes good money. People think that a career in sales means insurance or cosmetics (not that there’s anything wrong with those fields). But people who sell industrial equipment or work in tech (SAP, IBM) or services of any kind (think of a large hospital- every single thing inside came from a sale force from CT scan machines to sterilizing equipment to nutritional supplements for surgical patients who can’t swallow).