Career Counselor or directions for New Grad
Ok -- College is completed and grad is back home. I think they need someone besides their parents to help them organize their job search. Liberal arts major, interested in writing, some publishing experience, some library experience. Suggestions, either from your own (relatively recent) experience, or from your returned grad using a college counselor?
May 20, 2018
Parent Replies
Hi- I have a liberal arts grad, class of December 2016, who had little work experience upon graduation and is also interested in writing. My grad has decided he'd rather not do commercial (paid) writing, and instead reserve that as a personal pursuit. However, if your grad is interested in getting paid work writing, I'd suggest he/she develop a portfolio that includes samples appropriate for different commercial purposes, e.g. website content, blog posts, short service articles-- look at paid writing that appears in daily life and produce 'spec' pieces. Indeed.com is a good place for your grad to see what kinds of jobs are focused on writing skills, and what forms and styles are in demand. Your grad should consider volunteering to create content for non profits to build out the portfolio and generate references.
A couple other examples of writing-related work are technical writing and grant writing. Grant writing has more to do with knowing how to position a grant application to appeal to the grantor than writing per se, but of course, one needs to be able to write clearly and concisely. Technical writing is a specific field and your grad can probably find online courses in each of these fields. Caution, though-- writing for a living in these forms may not be appealing to your grad :-). That being said, a friend's daughter (late 20s) started out writing online content for Food and Wine magazine in NYC (which she really enjoyed, but which also required $ subsidy from her parents to live in NYC) and recently was contacted by a headhunter for a job that I assume involves content creation for UnderArmour in SF- paying low six figures.
Yes, the college should continue to provide career services for recent grads. That said, s/he basically just needs to set reasonable expectations for what an entry level job looks like, and start applying. Unemployment is at 4% right now (lower in many fields) - you can get an entry level job in many fields with a BA. It may not be a "dream job" but will be a great way to learn about the working world and gain qualifications.