A person’s opinion, or perception, as hayden clearly stated in post #306 is just that-- her opinion. It is not a “myth” (ie a tale, or a story) it is an opinion of the person responding to the comment. Even if an applicant is the greatest person in the world, if they come across in an interview like an arrogant or pompous jerk, they are not likely to get the job, no matter how brilliant they are. No one will want to work with them. Unless the job has them working alone and interfacing only with hardware and not with liveware, interpersona/communicationl skills will play a part in the hiring process, especially if all other things are pretty equal.</p>
<p>Emaheevul-
Congrats- that sounds like where your interest lie, and you should follow your heart. Good luck!</p>
<p>Son had a phone interview with Dell this morning and they want him in for an in-person interview. This business unit does server-related work. The Japanese company scheduled a phone interview for this afternoon and he has an aerospace company interview this afternoon too.</p>
<p>A coworker told me a little bit more about the company that he interviewed with yesterday: they have pensions and, they have every other Friday off. Oddball stuff compared to what I’m used to. Wall St it is not.</p>
<p>Every other Friday off seems more and more mainstream.</p>
<p>DS’ company works on the 9/80 plan. You work 80 hours in 9 days, I think it’s 9 hours/day in week 1 and then 9 hours M-Thurs week 2 with Friday off. They must shave an hour off somewhere for the math to work, lol.</p>
<p>I think it’s a great system - weekday off every other week for errands/personal appts/r&R/long weekend.</p>
<p>I shouldn’t be posting but can’t help myself lol! D looked and applied for many internships but has nothing. H is on his way to pick her up for the summer. D made an appointment with career services. Wanted to know if they had any ideas since she has nothing lined up for the summer. </p>
<p>Career Services was not very helpful. D is a junior in Mechanical Engineering. Counselor told her that employers want to see that she’s working, doesn’t really matter what she is doing as long as she’s working. D has worked since she was 14! It didn’t seem to help her in getting interviews or a summer internship. Wanted to know if she could get something in our home town. We live in a very rural area, unemployment is 15%. D interviewed for a job here. When she couldn’t travel the 750 miles from her school for a second interview, they wouldn’t consider her. Asked questions about summer school or picking up a minor, counselor couldn’t help. D asked her how she could maybe phrase things or try to explain her GPA, she had one bad semester, every other semester has been a 3.0 or higher, GPA is 3.0. Counselor didn’t have any idea.</p>
<p>Sorry, just venting my frustrations. D was in tears. Our S goes to a Tier 3 engineering school which is not highly rated. Their career services has been so much more helpful. They are really helpful with getting jobs and getting these kids through the interview process.</p>
<p>So I guess she’s coming home and hopefully will get her factory job back that she had last summer. She is very sad, depressed and discouraged. I have a friend who is an HR director. She said that she will help D with her interviewing skills, since I know that she is a bad interview.</p>
<p>She’s been looking and applying since January. Sent some apps in the fall but wanted to wait until first semester grades before looking in earnest. She had a 3.4 fall semester, she feels confident that she will do well this semester but grades won’t come out for a week.</p>
Well, yes, that is a nice idea. But of what use is it today, May 13??</p>
<p>It’s tough out there, no doubt about it. But these kids need to keep at it. DS found his summer Engineering job in late May after his junior year. When he was already back home, in our also rural area.</p>
<p>Just keep going online and applying for anything relevant - including possibly relevant jobs at non-tech firms. It can happen. Otherwise, the factory job is a fall back.</p>
<p>Maybe talk to someone who handles other functions at that factory company? Even offer to do unpaid intern type work with their engineers/IT people/whatever. That would be good on the resume.</p>
<p>I’m more used to a seamless work environment between the office,
home and when I’m on the road.</p>
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<p>I think that this is generally true.</p>
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<p>Our son’s first internship was five hours away by car and his second
was three hours away. One of the participants in his first internship
was almost 3,000 miles from home. A few others were 500 - 800 miles
from home.</p>
<p>It’s too late to apply now but there are lots of universities that
participate in REUs (Research Experience for Undergraduates) and
sometimes these things go begging for lack of students applying.
Sometimes they are fiercely competitive too. You can see a list at</p>
<p>These typically provide housing for students that aren’t local and
they often reimburse travel expenses. They don’t require an interview
as they know that this can be a big burden on college students. They
typically require that the student fill out an application, write a
statement of purpose, provide transcripts, a resume and two (sometimes
three) LORs.</p>
<p>I think that industry internships are generally more useful for
getting jobs after graduation while REUs are good if the student wants
to go to grad school.</p>
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<p>Summer courses at other institutions usually don’t count in GPA
calculations. A lot of engineering posts that I’ve seen have 3.0 as
the cutoff so she is at least in the running. I don’t know that she
would have to explain her GPA.</p>
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<p>I think that having a job in the current environment is something to
be happy about. My daughter is looking at minimum-wage jobs and she
is quite happy to do them and I’m quite happy that she is looking
for them.</p>
<p>I think that there is some advantage in the school being in an area
where there are a lot of companies and job opportunities if there
aren’t a lot of companies in the home area. The travel for the
second interview can be a big problem.</p>
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<p>Our son is also in a Tier 3. Their career center database and career
fairs were very useful in looking for jobs. He really didn’t use them
for interviewing prep (I found a bunch of videos and did the mock
interviews with him and provided him with coaching). My feeling is
that the do a good job as they provide the services.</p>
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<p>Sounds like he’s had a good experience there.</p>
<p>A lot of companies are doing the every other friday off type thing. My company has people who work all kinds of funky shifts… we have people who work 4 10 hour days… we also have people who work two 10 hour days, two 8 hour days, and then have a half day every friday, etc.</p>
<p>DS has an onsite interview next week at a company that he last had contact with in March. Kind of came out of the blue. Cross your fingers and say a prayer please!</p>
<p>A big factor is the choice of major. I went to a school career fair and 25/45 tables were for software engineers, hardware-related engineers and IT. Frankly right now, civil engineering, mechanical engineering and chemical engineering are terrible for job placement. Computer engineering, electrical engineering and computer science are doing very good.
Answer this question before sending a ridiculous amount of resumes: what skills can you market??? If you don’t have the skills, then learn them. (For example, mechanical engineers should have at the basis a mastery of autoCAD)</p>
<p>He’s in a great field. What is his school doing for him? Any campus sponsored job fairs? He will have a bright future if he’s flexible and doesn’t mind reloacating to where the jobs are. This will be a better year to get job than last two years. The problem is kids who graduated last year and year before are still searching or underemployed right now which means back log of resume’s for each opening. But ecomony is showing signs of turning around and which indicates good prospects for this year’s graduates.</p>
<p>“There were about three unemployed workers for every opening online in March, according to The Conference Board.”</p>
<p>“On the other hand, the number of jobseekers per opening in computer and math jobs which includes statisticians and computer programmers, at about 0.21, is practically identical to the 0.19 unemployed workers per opening that field had in December 2007, when the recession began.”</p>
<p>Thanks for the article BCEagle: And, as noted by the one person who wrote a comment to that article: not job postings are legitimate. That’s the heart-breaking part. The companies who post these jobs aren’t really looking to hire. They just want to keep a file of prospective employees.</p>
<p>It IS an amazingly tough job market out there. Congrats to the kids who keep trying to get a job; persistence can be the important factor, as well as being willing to intern/volunteer to learn skills even tho it may not pay anything, to those who can afford it–it can be a boost to the resume if there is relevant volunteer experience.</p>
<p>Received a background check report yesterday from the company DD is going to do a 12 weeks summer internship. I was surprised to know that they are doing such an extensive checks. The report includes county records check from both our county and college county and federal report from both counties and also a credit history check.</p>
<p>Is this the norm now a days for internships? It was not done last year by the startup DD did the internship with.</p>
<p>Its a very smart thing for companies to do- especially for anyone having access to sensitive information of any kind, or access to systems that they could cause damage to. Surely they are not profiling…</p>
<p>It depends on what kind of work a company is doing. D1’s friend working for a consulting firm which does a lot of work for the government had to go through a very extensive background checking. His hourly rate that his company charges out went up after he got his clearance, and his salary also went up.</p>