With less than 20 days left of the academic year and commencement underway, seniors are preparing for life after Elon. The university’s Student Professional Development Center is one group on campus working closely with the upcoming graduates to figure out the next steps.
The SPDC, which assists with career development, works with undergraduates, graduate students and alum, but during this time of year, many of the students walking through the center’s doors are seniors.
According to director of the SPDC, Brooke Buffington, the center is finding a variety of opportunities available for students, even with the job market looking unpredictable in many industries. The office constantly keeps up with the job market and employment trends to guide students.
“Even though we're seeing a lot of news about the job market looking questionable, the entry level market is pretty solid right now,” Buffington said. “I wouldn't say it's as strong as it was last year when it was really crazy, but it's not atypical for a traditional year of hiring.”
Since January, mass layoffs have been hitting many companies in different industries — entertainment, finance, retail, and most recently, tech. Companies citing layoffs are often due to recession fears, cutting company costs and staff reorganization.
While some students are worried about bigger companies cutting positions across the board, the SPDC is finding that many of the layoffs are occuring at the mid-level positions, and not so much at the entry-level positions. For seniors going straight into the workforce after college, this can be positive as many of the positions available are entry-level. The SPDC and its satellite offices, located in separate schools across campus, are constantly sending new job, internship and program opportunities to students.
“We're still seeing our university recruiting and relations teams working with us,” Buffington said. “We're still seeing them have hiring needs.”
The opportunities availables also align with the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ current unemployment rate of 3.5%, showing that the U.S. labor market is strong. In March, the Labor Department reported that nonfarm payrolls, a measure of the number of U.S. workers that excludes proprietors, private household employees, unpaid volunteers, farm employees, and self-employees, grew by 236,000. The Bureau is set to release the April eemployment ssituation May 5.
Noah Levine, a senior studying strategic communications, said the university helped him decide the career he wants to enter: advertising and marketing. He said he’s still in the process of looking for a job.
“A lot of them require a lot of experience, or they're just looking for internships, which is kind of annoying because I want that entry level career,” Levine said.
Levine works in the SPDC as a student ambassador, where he manages the day-to-day operations of the center; email interactions, phone calls and center promotion. He said the SPDC has been the backbone for his professional development and helped him look for jobs, even when employment in some industries can look concerning.
“I know that people have been talking about there's a recession, or things are on the decline, and I feel like I've kind of seen that a lot. There's probably not as many jobs that are super eager to hire, maybe as there were a couple of years ago, but I think there still are a lot of opportunities,” Levine said. “I think someone can always find something even in tough times.”
For some students though, the job search has been much more challenging. Senior Emily Burgess, a human service studies major, said finding an entry-level position is difficult for her, especially with the career she wants to pursue. The majority of careers in human services or social work often require an education beyond a bbachelor’’s degree degree.
“Already off the bat with an entry level job, it can be really difficult to get something, especially with not having a master's degree with some of the roles and different jobs that I would probably like,” Burgess said. “It’s been genuinely very difficult.”
Understanding the different subsets of hiring is important for those confused or concerned about employment, Buffington said. The SPDC often finds that business employers tend to hire earlier in the academic year and in large groups. On the other hand, employers in communications, art and education tend to hire in the spring.
“It takes longer than you think it will, and it's not going to happen the way that you think it will. The job search process tends to have its ups and downs,”” Buffington Buffington said. “You'll apply to maybe a handful of things, and for a week, not hear anything, and then all of a sudden get three interviews on the same day.”
To keep up with seniors after graduation, the SPDC sends out a destination survey given around the time of commencement and two weeks after graduation. The survey asks whether the student has secured a job, what the next steps are or if they need more assistance. The purpose of the survey is to keep up with graduates even after they leave Elon.
As employment is different for everyone, Buffington’s advice to seniors and anyone in the process of their career development is to show quality over quantity in their work.
“The more that you can show that you're really interested in that opportunity and that organization in that location, and that role specifically, the more that you're going to be on their priority list right,” Buffington said.