I can earn the same $0 at marketing firm and I didn't go to Yale.
As a matter of fact, I am so talented, I can earn $0 at many careers.
Posted on 03/19/2002 6:45:37 AM PST by marshmallow
I worked hard in junior high. I worked harder in high school.
I took home more straight A report cards than any kid in my class. I scored just shy of 1400 on my SATs. I rode horses. I played tennis and basketball. I taught English as a second language.
I had no social life until I was 17. But I got into Yale. Then I worked harder than I ever had.
I was sure the payoff would be a multitude of attractive, not to mention lucrative, job offers upon graduation. Then the bottom dropped out of the economy.
So far, my Yale degree has secured me an e-mail forwarding address and a lifetime of alumni dues notices. Not exactly what I expected.
I was an English major which, for most people, roughly translates into "I have no marketable skills." But that's not so. I have many valuable skills honed during my days with Dickens, my nights with Nabokov, those wee hours with Woolf.
First of all, you know I can read. And I don't mean read like "Hooked on Phonics" read. I can read long, wordy, small printed works with relative speed and what's more, I can remember what I have read and write long, wordy, papers about it without any trouble. I have developed impressive analytical skills. I am trained to think -- really think -- about everything I read. And I am accomplished at putting those thoughts on paper.
So where does that all leave me? Unemployed.
I have taken that Yale degree to marketing firms, publishing companies, advertising agencies, and it has not worked any magic. If I leave the degree behind, I am hired on the spot to wait tables for $10 to $20 an hour depending on tips (and since I have well-developed public relations skills from that internship with the Commission on Human Rights, I will get closer to $20 an hour).
Erase Yale from my past and with little trouble I land a retail position helping rich ladies whose most prized degree is their "Mrs." find handbags to match the only type of investment they know how to make: shoes. Take that degree off my wall and I easily obtain a position at a local Starbucks, serving up nonfat lattes to busy professionals and harried college kids who don't know that the degree they are currently working their butts off for will be worth less than their stainless steel coffee mugs.
So I can earn $0 an hour not working at a marketing firm with my Yale degree, or potentially earn a couple of hundred bucks a night serving up fajitas at Chili's.
I can forfeit a paycheck while not employed with a publishing company, or I can earn seven bucks an hour plus commission folding sweaters at that boutique down the street. I can be broke while the ad agencies keep sending me letters beginning with, "Thank you for submitting your résumé. . . ," but you get the picture.
Will someone please tell me where I went wrong?
Shawna Gale lives in Atlanta
I have to disagree. The greatest gift a parent can give a child is the ability to survive in this world.
I can earn the same $0 at marketing firm and I didn't go to Yale.
As a matter of fact, I am so talented, I can earn $0 at many careers.
Amazing the flexiblity that chem degree will get me.
Seriously, your mistake was majoring in a field in which there are really very few jobs. If you as intelligent as you sound, and a good career after college was your goal, why didn't you pick a harder (but more valuable) major?
You made a poor decision- get some education and training that will be useful to an employer, and you will be employed.
It's really that simple.
I'm not defending her or her attitude, but the $20/hr figure was for waiting tables and included tips. Ten years ago, I lost my job and after some soul-searching, decided to make a career change. For two years after that, I went to tech school full-time days, and bartended/waitered at night.
Yea, I made the equivalent of $35-40K/yr., but that was a tough way to make a living. Many a night I came home with a headache, sore feet, and dried out hands wondering about the path I had taken.
Like I said, I'm not defending her, but I can understand why she would be less than excited about this option. Additionally, this women made the commitment to attend Yale and get a degree. Nobody requires a degree to wait tables. I can certainly understand a little "why did I bother" self-questioning on her part.
With that being said, I agree with the poster who said take the waitressing position. At least she'll be making money while showing she has some ambition.
Monday comes around, and our hero reports to the boss's office at 9:00 AM.
The boss looks up from his work to ask what the young fellow wants.
The young fellow says, "Sir, don't you remember me? You hired me last week."
The boss replies, "Oh yeah. Here, take this broom and start sweeping the floor."
The young fellow responds, "But sir, I'm a Harvard Graduate."
The boss answers, "Oh alright--I'll show you how."
I could start all over tomorrow mowing lawns, cleaning pools or something, and make enough money to get by until I ran across an opportunity to do something that I liked that would utilize that education. Then I would soar like an eagle, never looking back and would someday bore the hell out of my grandkids with tales of hardship.
While one of the purposes of formal education -- by which I take it you mean as a student in school or a college -- is to have one's studies and learning directed by educated men and women who can save one untold time and trial-and-error efforts, many who have achieved greatness have been self-educated. Schools have no monopoly on learning. It is the inquiring mind that seeks knowledge, and the enterprising spirit which enables one to make an opportunity in almost any situation. Neither gift is common. Once, this country emphasized the enterprising spirit and respected the inquiring mind, especially in combination. For many years, however, we have succumbed to an emphasis on formal credentials rather than the knowledge they once represented.
Same here. I graduated college in a recession and spent months looking for work. Ended up taking a part-time tech writing/office assistant/guy friday job that was "beneath me". But I didn't go whining about it, and guess what, I parlayed the experience on that job to a full time position with the same firm, then took that to a Fortune 500 software company that paid for night school. I took that and parlayed it into a good programming career.
My point? The lady should stop whining, start small, and work up. That's the way it happens in real life.
LOL!
I graduated from Yale in 1964. I also majored in English, plus a separate complete major in Political Science. I also worked my butt off.
There was not an economic downturn going on when I entred the job market. But I chose to move to San Francisco, where jobs do not grow on trees. So, what was my first job as a Yale graduate?
I sold Fuller Brush products door-to=door. That's right, lady, a sample case of brushes, well-shined shoes, trudging up to the doors of house after house. It sure as heck wasn't what I expected when I got my sheepskin in New Haven. But I had a wife to support and a child on the way.
I did not have time to whine about people not bowing down and offering me money when I waved my degree. I needed honorable income. I needed it now. And whining about anything would have done me and my family no good.
Since then I've done many things that I thought better justified the excellent education I got at Yale. But I will never forget the experience of my first job as a graduate.
I have zero sympathy for you, lady. You have a rotten attitude to go with your degree. Maybe if you sold some brushes door to door for a few months you would wake up and smell the coffee. In the meantime, take your whining elsewhere. This homey don't buy it.
Congressman Billybob
New column: "The Truman Factor."
Post Script to my friends on FreeRepublic: I am bone wery of trying to communicate with or through the Atlanta Constitution. But if anyone wants to send them by response to this article, feel free. If they had the guts to print it, I would cheerfully give them my name, address, phone number, social security number, identifying moles, and a description of my supervisor at Fuller Brush in the fall of 1964, who was a fine boss, by the way.
This is the time of year when Seniors are waiting to know whether one college or another has admitted them. Perhaps this will enable them to perceive that not being admitted to "THE" school is not only not disastrous but may be advantageous long term.
Second, find out what the employers in your field of interest NEED, and learn how to fill that need. No employer cares how great you are. You have to be USEFUL to them.
First, take whatever you can get that will put beans on the table.
Second, volunteer your services to a worthy cause, and start your second career (the one you really want) from there. If you're really as good as you say you are, you will be recognized.
Third, quit the whining!
Let's see - leftist, elitist wench "deserves" high-paying job despite lack of demonstrated business achievement. Cry me a river.
Boortz was talking about this the other day. He's ALL OVER this gal, has invited her to call in. Like that will happen! HA!
Here's Boortz's commentary on this from today's Nealz Nuze:
ATLANTA’S “WAILING YALIE”
We first started talking about this a week ago. Her name is Shawna Gale, and she is a Yale graduate. (I’ll pause here to let you get over your sense of amazement.) Shawna wrote a column for the Atlanta Journal-Constitution a week ago bemoaning her difficulties in finding a job. It wasn’t supposed to be this way, you know, because, after all, she graduated from YALE! With an English degree no less!!!!
If you haven’t yet read Shawna’s column .. here’s your link. http://www.accessatlanta.com/ajc/epaper/editions/tuesday/opinion_c3692eaa024a915a00f5.html
Now … please note the last line of Shawna’s complaint. “Will someone please tell me where I went wrong?”
I bring this up again today because Shawna has become somewhat of an Internet hot-topic! One particular website has names here the “Wailin’ Yalie.” Readers of this website have been taking her to task since her column appeared. No, you don’t have to go search for that site. Here’s your link. http://www.obscurestore.com/letters.html
OK … let’s read her column and take a stab at this “where I went wrong” bit.
It’s not your Yale degree that’s holding you back, Shawna. It’s your leftist, anti-achievement, holier-than-thou, snotty, arrogant elitist attitude. You somehow have developed an idea that you’re really some kind of hot stuff – with your Yale degree and all – and that people should be dragging their butts through ten miles of hot coals just to pick up a copy of your resume!
Just look at these excerpts from your AJC column:
“I have many valuable skills honed during my days with Dickens, my nights with Nabokov, those wee hours with Woolf.”
Well, isn’t that special. Dickens, Nabokov and Woolf. Those people who could offer you the jobs you want probably don’t know Nabokov and Wolf from their neighbor’s gardener, and your elitist name-dropping fails to impress them. Tell them you’ve read The Wall Street Journal and that you’re a fan of Thomas Sowell.
“I can read long, wordy, small printed works with relative speed and what's more, I can remember what I have read and write long, wordy, papers about it …”
It’s not the reading, it’s the understanding. And businessmen don’t like long, wordy papers. Tell them you can read something obscure and complicated and translated it into language that someone with a sixth-grade education can understand. So, you can write on a Yale level. Can you write on an Atlanta government schools level?
“If I leave the degree behind, I am hired on the spot to wait tables for $10 to $20 an hour depending on tips (and since I have well-developed public relations skills from that internship with the Commission on Human Rights, I will get closer to $20 an hour).”
Take a hint. First of all – there’s nothing demeaning about making $20 an hour waiting tables. You’ll learn a lot more about people in this job than you did in your years at Yale. Secondly, forget that internship with the Commission on Human Rights. Telling people about this experience is like tattooing “I’m a brain-dead liberal with no rational thinking skills” on your forehead. If I was looking at your resume I would guess that you think the U.S. is a major worldwide violator of human rights. I would then toss your resume in the circular file.
“Erase Yale from my past and with little trouble I land a retail position helping rich ladies whose most prized degree is their "Mrs." find handbags to match the only type of investment they know how to make: shoes.”
Oh, I see. You went to Yale. You can read wordy, small printed works. You have an English degree. You’re hot stuff and much too good to spend time with those evil “rich ladies” who have done nothing in life but get married and buy shoes. I can’t think of any employer, save a college or university, who would want an elitist snot like you on their payroll. You want to work for a publishing company? Fine --- what if those “rich ladies” want to buy something you’ve worked on? Would that offend your Ivy League sensibilities?
Look, Shawna. Cut to the chase. You’re a leftist. Private businesses don’t like to hire leftists. Get a teaching job at a college or university where you belong. Go look for a permanent paid job on that Commission on Human Rights. Send a resume to the Democratic Party or the U.N. There just has to be a place for you somewhere.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.