A Little Pre-Graduation Aggravation

I should be one happy camper. A 21-year-old who, in a few short months, will be setting out on his own into a great big world filled with wonderful sights and abundant opportunities. Right now, I'm applying for jobs and deciding where in the country I'd like to spend the next few years of my life. But as the resumes get mailed and my inbox remains empty, I'm left with shrugged shoulders and open palms, wondering where life will lead me post-May.

My first mistake, clearly, was electing to allow the university to confer upon me the most worthless of all degrees, the B.A. in liberal arts. And as my contact info at the end of this column indicates, I've further punished myself with two of the more ambiguous majors an undergraduate can study - political science and history. Sure I can tell you that the reason Stalin rose to power was that, as general secretary of his party, he hired most of the party workers who in turn felt loyal to him (thank you, Prof. Joel Blatt), but I can't really tell you why that matters today, save for don't ever make a psychologically tormented, pockmarked, power-hungry madman the general secretary of your newly founded political party. But I digress.

I could have chosen the brighter, albeit more soulless path - that of the, gasp, business major, but in my senior year in high school I grew rather attached to my inner-self. It is an attachment I regret to this very day. For while the business majors sit in their fancy classrooms with ample room to move around, a comfortable chair and a guaranteed internet connection, I sit in the slightly outdated Koons Hall hoping I don't get stuck in the desk made for a left-handed middle school student, wondering what it might be like to have Internet in the classroom. And while they get jobs thrown at them left and right by hungry corporations eager to gobble up the malleable talent, I get persistent leg cramps from immobility with the only perk getting sent my way being the asbestos-laden and poorly circulated air.

Yet still I send away the resumes and cover letters, dutifully awaiting responses while wondering if the only way I will get down to Washington D.C. is not as a researcher or legislative assistant, but rather as a waiter. Might I interest you in some coffee or dessert this evening?

Maybe it is the job market keeping me down. After all, the economy is, according to media outlets everywhere and two branches of government, headed down the proverbial tubes. No struggling firm wants to hire the young greenhorn with few marketable stills and the propensity to change his mind about whatever job he lands in. I don't blame them. Maybe I should blame Republican economics. It seems to be the hip thing to do these days.

But what if it isn't the economy? College admissions statistics, by all measurable standards, have skyrocketed in the last decade. Where only a few years ago there were a few people like me bopping around the country with similar grades, experiences, ambitions and connections (specifically, no connections), now there are hundreds of me eagerly swimming in the talent pool praying to float by a dangling hook.

As the sun rises and sets, and the Xs on the calendar denoting the expended days in my sheltered academic life steadily mount, each subtle reminder of graduation, a day once revered in my academic life, places a cloud of melancholy squarely over my head. A few days ago, my degree audit notice arrived, and while I celebrated then at the prospect of sprinting out the doors of Gampel Pavilion with degree in hand, today I lament. Even my current employer, The Daily Campus, informed me yesterday to start thinking about a replacement. If only I could nominate myself.

Maybe I'll fail a class, or two - or three. Then they can't give me my degree then. I'll have defeated the system! After all, no one wants to hire a kid who's still in college, or who has failed college. At least then there will be a reason for the futility of the job search in which I am currently entrenched.

Alas, these thoughts are foolish. Eventually, I'll find an appropriate placement which will allow both employer and I to realize our full potential - and both employer and I will be better for the protracted manner in which today's job search takes place. But with a countless number of job search Web sites out there and different employers listed on each one, there is no guarantee that I don't languish in one set of listings while my dream job is listed on another.

Aristotle is believed to have said "the roots of education are bitter, but the fruit is sweet." As I march toward graduation, the roots of the tree appear only to be growing and the idea of an apartment in a city suburb slowly shifts to a cozy space in my old Southington bedroom.

So far, I think Aristotle is full of crap.

Commentary Editor Kyle Thomas is an 8th-semester political science and history double major. He can be reached at Kyle.Thomas@UConn.edu.