You Have No Idea How Jobs Will Actually Be
You’d think
you’d learn a lot about the job market in college, and there’s certainly some
discussion of it, but when I graduated with a journalism degree as a woman from
a state school, no one bothered to mention that 95% of the jobs would be given
to white men from better schools. That the internships would be reserved for people with impossible-for-me connections and generous financial support. Most of us are hoping
we luck out in the real-world mentor department, and most of us graduate still
hoping. Colleges could help prep students by explaining in very broad terms to
freshman what various career paths look like by have students research their
pay, employment rates, job satisfaction, salaries before ever picking a major.
What are the ideal jobs for someone with your major, and what does the reality
look like? For me, I ended up taking a job copy editing press releases out of
college for five years, which paid well, but it’s something I still consider one
of the most soul-sucking enterprises of my adult life (and I’ve scraped the
paint off a house by hand). Also, this is not about just seeing what a
veterinarian does every day on the job (though that’s helpful); it’s about
seeing the choices various successful career folks made to get where they are,
one tricky job move at a time.
Office Politics: Someone Already Hates You, and You Just Started!
This could be
considered part of a course on careers, but it’s really its own uniquely
insidious little life lesson. Because hoo-boy is it disillusioning to show up
at a job, fresh out of university as an eager little meritocracy beaver, only to
discover that the only meritocracy to be found is figuring which of the people your boss likes more will get the promotion. That’s right: In the real world, mediocre
people can be promoted often, while hard workers can be ignored or maligned just
cuz. Them’s the breaks, kid. Friends hire friends, bosses have irrationally reasoned favorites, and nearly every place of
employment has a toxic coworker and a secret saboteur and a magical golden child (and they are often the
same person! And that person is loved! Because they made a pie once!). There’s
no reason to incite panic and fear in fresh-faced future workers, but students
a mere year or two away from seeking internships DESERVE to be taught how to
enter a workplace neutrally, but armed with the knowledge that no place is ever
what it seems.
Everyone is Out to Take Your Money
Could also be
called: How to be an Adult. Did you
know that when you have to get the gas turned on at your first place that you
have to pay a deposit, but you could get out of it if you had someone cosign or if you pass a credit check? But that if you choose the credit check option, and it doesn’t go through, they won’t let you then have someone cosign, because you already picked your choice — and it was the wrong choice? I’m serious. Shit like this is not always
obvious, and most places will let you hang yourself on the fuckery of large fees, because why should they give a shit? Not getting screwed over in the world
requires a kind of constant consumer vigilance, a willingness to advocate for
yourself when no one else will.
Bank accounts,
savings accounts, good interest rates, starting a retirement fund — who knows
how to do any of this stuff right off the bat? When does that person the insurance company sends to explain it ever actually help? But I would scrap all that
knowledge if young adults were taught something even older adults still aren’t
sure how to do: how to buy a car without getting fucked over. Buying a car is
one of the most stomach-churning displays of the dark side of power there is, and few
people are prepared to do battle with these unethical henchpeeps. Training young
people on the art of dealing with the fuckery of car shilling goes beyond
practical training, IT IS A REVOLUTION.
Your Insurance Will Pay for Your IUD But Not the Required Pre-Insertion Pregnancy Test
Do you even know
what a deductible is? Or how to manage one? Or how high yours should be? Or
when to schedule certain kinds of healthcare choices so as to avoid paying your
whole deductible in December only to re-up first thing in January? Do you know
how to pick a health plan? Does just thinking about this make you want to die,
but dying is too expensive? Exactly.
How to Red-Team Any Situation
Red-Teaming is basically shooting holes in any idea or plan to understand its weaknesses. This is a valuable skill throughout life that comes in handy constantly when deciding to take a new job, buy a house, move to a new city, trade in your car, plan a day at Disneyland. It’s meant to improve any strategy by recognizing the vulnerabilities in the plan, and though most four-year-degrees teach you something about thinking critically, that’s not the same thing as strategizing.
You Have No Idea How to Make a Relationship Work
I saved the best
for last, because all that stuff above is super real and critical, but you may
very likely spend most of your free time outside of work or on hold with your
bank chilling with another human being. And most human beings are piss poor at
being with other human beings. It takes real skill to make a relationship work,
not just fireworks. Yes, sociology departments certainly offer classes about
marriage and family, and some of them offer practical guidance on marriage
readiness and how to do a budget. Post-college couples on the marriage track
can read books, take quizzes online, or participate in counseling they pay for
or get free through their church to gauge their readiness. But given that most
people desire stable, lasting relationships at some point in their lives, and
most people pursue them based on love and affection and not necessarily ability
to weather storms, this sort of education should start early and be regarded as
important as Western Civ.
Northwestern
University has a
special course offering that specifically aims to teach students how to
have good relationships. In it, freshly minted adults part with the notion of
soul mates, and do so by interviewing their parents about their marriage (or
divorce), ask friends to help the student identify their own shortcomings and triggers,
and work on projects that teach them critical cornerstones of healthy
relationships, like the significance of knowing yourself to be good at
marriage, accepting that some conflict in marriage is healthy and learning how
to deal with it, fighting fair, and the importance of a shared worldview. Instructors
told The Atlantic that they see the class as a kind of “inoculation against potential life trauma.” Amen
to that.
Image by Jim Cooke.
