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Canadian Millennials Struggle As College Degrees Don't Guarantee Jobs (www.cbc.ca)
"CBC News is reporting on how millennials are finding that education only guarantees debt, not a stable job. Not even in STEM," writes Slashdot reader BarbaraHudson, adding "The irony -- one of the teachers touting the values of further education is herself part of the gig economy." An anonymous reader summarizes the article, which reports that 33% of the engineers in Ontario are now underemployed.
"I actually thought that coming out of school I would be a commodity and someone would want me," said one 21-year-old mechanical engineering graduate. "But instead, I got hit with a wall of being not wanted whatsoever in the industry." He's applied for 250 engineering jobs, resulting in four interviews, but no job offer, and he's since broadened his job search to the deli counter at the local grocery store, because "It's a job."
"More than 12% of Canadians between the ages of 15 and 24 are unemployed," reports CBC News, "and more than a quarter are underemployed, meaning they have degrees but end up in jobs that don't require them. The latest numbers from Statistics Canada show that the unemployment rate for 15-to-24-year-olds is almost twice that of the general population... A 2014 Canadian Teachers' Federation report found nearly a quarter of Canada's youth are either unemployed, working less than they want or have given up looking for work entirely."
The article also points out that the number of students enrolled in Canadian universities has more than doubled since 1980, from 800,000 to over two million.
"More than 12% of Canadians between the ages of 15 and 24 are unemployed," reports CBC News, "and more than a quarter are underemployed, meaning they have degrees but end up in jobs that don't require them. The latest numbers from Statistics Canada show that the unemployment rate for 15-to-24-year-olds is almost twice that of the general population... A 2014 Canadian Teachers' Federation report found nearly a quarter of Canada's youth are either unemployed, working less than they want or have given up looking for work entirely."
The article also points out that the number of students enrolled in Canadian universities has more than doubled since 1980, from 800,000 to over two million.
IEEE The STEM Crisis is a myth http://spectrum.ieee.org/at-wo...
They have an entire issue devoted to the topic and a static discussion
http://spectrum.ieee.org/stati...
The only shortage of degreed professionals are MD's and Lawyers and that's because their numbers are controlled and kept artificially low.
Somebody at a school trying to sell you a degree, make sure they back it up with a job guarantee, or at least a track record that you can sue them over.
Almost everything I read in this thread is "Well, I got my degree. You OWE me a job."
Might I suggest getting a degree? Your reading comprehension skills would improve to the point where you could understand no one in this thread is saying that.
Instead, they are talking about the structural problem of too many people getting degrees due to societal and government promotion of degree programs and claims of shortages.
Or more simply, no one is saying they are owed a job. They are saying "everyone claimed this was the right path, and provided statistics and money to back up that claim. Turns out, it isn't true".
You don't know what a co-op is do you?
Hint: It's not an unpaid internship.
That's exactly what co-op's are in most cases. There is no requirement for payment, and those that pay are very few and far between. I did two of them myself back in the 90's, one as a mechanic, another as a welder. Rather the co-op program has always been an extension of the trades programs in schools to allow the student to see if their choice was the "right fit" for them. It also allowed you to start collecting your hours as part of your apprenticeship. The 4h/day I did under the program I was under, allowed me to apply it directly to my mechanics apprenticeship. I was good enough that the person who took me on also hired me for full weekends, and when I graduated, I started my apprenticeship there.
The real problem for Canada's job markets though? There's multiple problems. First you have governments like the Liberals in Ontario, BC, Maritimes and NDP in Alberta who have anti-job policies. They raise taxes, gut programs for jobs that are highly in demand, and/or take on so much debt that businesses are wary around investing. Or you have governments like both the former Federal Conservatives and the current Liberals that love their "imported labor" programs. And would rather "spread the wealth" while people in Canada can't find work. It's pretty hard for anyone to justify the TFW program, in a province with 10% unemployment. But the Liberal Party sure does, even undoing some of the safeguards that the previous conservative government put into place.
Unlike the US and H1B's, in Canada no job is safe from a TFW. It doesn't matter if it's janitorial, or a skilled trade. If a company can figure out how to game the TFW system, lay you off, and replace you with someone they can pay the min. wage for vs say the $20-25/hr you currently work for, they will.
Om, nomnomnom...
There is no shortage in Toronto, which is an old rust belt city, across Lake Erie from Detroit. They would have much better opportunities in Vancouver. Instead of whining about not getting their perceived entitlement, these people need to be proactive and take some responsibility for their own future.
Disclaimer: I have lived, worked and pursued opportunities in four states and three countries.
Apparently never in Canada. Toronto has always been a "business city" aka white collar work and it's been like that since the 1800's when farming was pushed out and into the greenbelt. It's right on Lake Ontario, Lake Erie is ~150km away. Hamilton is an old rust belt city, it's where the steel mills were, it's where the cargo ports are, it's where the harbor is to make new ships. If they went to Vancouver they'd be in exactly the same spot as Toronto, but they'd be paying 4x the price for rent and double the price for food, and be struggling to make mortgage payments on a $500k/year salary.. If you want to get good money in STEM in Canada, you head to Alberta or Manitoba. Perhaps some areas of Quebec or the maritimes.
Disclaimer: I've worked in Ontario most of my life, outside of 5-24mo stints in the western provinces of Canada, and Singapore.
Om, nomnomnom...
The single most valuable thing I ever read in my life was a book on "How to write a great cover letter" (that may or may not have been the title - it was a long time ago).
But I remembered the advice in the book, and it has served me well. A great cover letter is FAR MORE IMPORTANT than a great CV, because that one paragraph is what determines whose CV's get read at all.
These days - the "cover letter' is the wording of the e-mail you attach your CV to. That's where you determine if the person whose job it is to filter out the time-wasters (most likely a professional head-hunter these days) will bother with your CV at all.
Once you have enough professional experience that stops mattering, recruiters start coming after you - and then you don't need to convince the company to read your CV anymore, the recruiters do that for you. But starting out - learn to write a good cover letter. In a few world tell them why you want the job, why you believe you'll be good at it and what makes you think you'll be a good fit for the company. Never go over one paragraph. Don't go into detail (that's what the CV is for). Just - very quickly - sell yourself as worth the time to read, by saying why you are excited to be applying.
Get the cover letter right - and you've won 90% of the battle - now you are only competing with the other 10% of people who got the cover letter right.
Unicode killed the ASCII-art *