Mr Obama, stop the BS song and dance and do something REAL about the high cost of college. Here’s a link to a Whitehouse website article about how they care about making higher education more affordable and the tax credits they are giving or expanding to help make that happen. ARE YOU KIDDING ME? Some measly tax credits aren’t enough to make a difference and they aren’t going to help me get a job after I get that overpriced degree.

Upping a Pell grant by $800 is going to help me pay for college? And what is the American Opportunity Tax Credit? Go read all the FAQ’s associated with it and tell me how that is going to really help me. More red tape I have to go through to get all or part of some tax credit for up to $2500 is NOT going to help!

College costs a hell of a lot and we have to pay with loans and our own money. I don’t need small tax credits from Obama and more empty rhetoric, I need him to get the costs DOWN. Most colleges cost $10,000 or more per year and those tax credits hardly make a dent. I NEED TO PAY LESS UPFRONT!

Maybe he can’t do much about private colleges but he can surely do something about state colleges. He can start by spending less money and not bankrupting this country. He can make getting colleges to lower their prices a priority and he can lead from the top. Of course that would be if he really cares and obviously he doesn’t.

Lots of college aged students helped Obama get elected because he gave them hope. Three years later all we see is record numbers of debt being piled up and a lot of excuses. We see Occupy Wall Street protests everywhere being led by our generation of pissed off 20 to 30 year olds who can’t get jobs even when they have a college degree. We need to see real change and not more BS posturing from the Whitehouse.

Everyone knows that interns get paid little or nothing and that is why you might not be keen on getting one. If you have fixed bills to pay and the internship doesn’t pay enough for you to make ends meet, you might not have this option. But for those students who want to get their foot in the door of a company that might actually be interested in hiring them later, an internship can be the way to go.

This isn’t the case just for the tech industry as all sorts of company hire interns. You have to remember that the competition for all jobs in America is super high right now and many college students and graduates are finding it almost impossible to find work. Becoming an intern first is a real way to get ahead of the pack and make connections within a company. If you are an intern that works hard, does an outstanding job, and is liked, don’t you think that company will perhaps hire you before they interview unknowns to fill a job?

Jobs for college students are in high demand throughout the school year and during summer vacation as well. Even if you aren’t really looking for a career right now, getting an internship will look good on your resume and may lead to something later on. It is smart to be thinking ahead as much as possible because at this point, it is unlikely the economy and jobs situation is going to improve any time soon.

A recent article outlines the possible hard times ahead for younger generations who want to live a good life and retire in their 60′s which is the traditional age most people associate with retirement. With 40 years of inflation ahead of us, the switch from guaranteed pensions to employee funded 401K’s, and the uncertainty that Social Security will still be solvent, it is clear that today’s college students have a very unsure future ahead of them.

It is clear that making as much money as possible and learning how to invest it is the best path if you want to be able to retire comfortably. An additional problem is that so many students now graduate with tens of thousands of dollars in school debt that it is often many years before they can pay it off and actually start saving. That is if they can even find a job in the first place!

College students should be thinking long and hard about what they want in their future because the direction they take with their major and classes could be a determining factor. For instance, while history may be interesting to some students, they should know that it won’t lead to any high paying jobs. There are a lot of crazy majors now days and many of them will get you a degree but that is about it. Employers want to see a work history and a solid education in the same field as the job opening.

Jobs for college students that are in the same field as your major are a great addition to your resume as all relevant work history is a plus. The important thing is that it is vital in today’s floundering economy that college students get serious about their futures right away. Yes, college is fun and should be fun but those students who actively look to their futures with a plan will be the ones who do best in the long run.

Hopefully the $2,000,000 number is way high but it serves as a reminder that students are in the beginning stages of mapping out their dreams and their lives. It is going to be a long hard uphill battle for many young people and they should be picking their college majors carefully with an eye on what different jobs pay.

Young adults today who are looking for jobs for college students or for graduates, surely know how to sign up for sites like Snagajob, Monster, and Job.com. They of all people are familiar with the Internet and are comfortable using it to do a variety of things which include getting their resumes online so that the right people can find them. But for this “Internet generation”, they must fight the tendency to be lazy and stop there.

The job hunt can’t end with what you do online. Not in this economy. Several years ago you might have been able to get away with putting your resume online and applying to a few jobs before being accepted but not now. In 2011 and going forward, getting a job usually means having to work hard to get it.

So, what should you be doing after you put your resume online?

1) Networking. Do it online and offline. Connect with as many people and businesses as you can and let them all know you are looking for a job. The more legwork you do on your own, the better chance you will have of meeting someone that has a job for you or knows someone who can help you.

2) Personalize every resume and cover letter you send out. It’s much easier to send your stock resume along with a general cover letter but that is what most other people are doing. You need to set yourself apart and show employers that you are the real deal. The extra effort you put into constructing customized resumes and cover letters tailored for each possible job could make the difference.

3) Double and triple check your spelling and grammar. A mispelled misspelled word or sloppy sentence is not what you want to have at this stage of the game. Given two candidates that are equal, an employer will probably hire the one that didn’t make the mistake(s) on their resume.

4) Look everywhere. If you can’t seem to find a job on campus, look off campus. If you can’t find a job in your college town, start expanding your search. Look for online jobs or freelance opportunities online. Be as creative as you can and think out of the box. Yes, I know that is easier said than done but use this job hunting time to learn about yourself and figure out what you can and can’t do.

Remember, this is probably not going to be the last time in your life you will be looking for a job. Hopefully it will, but the odds say it isn’t. Work hard to learn how to find a job. Some people are definitely better at it than others and generally speaking, those that put in the most effort are the ones that end up being the most successful at finding something.

1) You might start out by looking at your college’s website to see what jobs are posted there. Usually they will have all jobs within the university such as library jobs, food service jobs, RA jobs, and other types of work where you won’t even need to leave campus. Often times though, while convenient, those jobs won’t pay as much as you might be able to make off campus.

2) After looking online you should head off to shops and restaurants surrounding your school. The earlier you begin your job hunt there, the more likely you will be to find actual jobs that are open. You can’t procrastinate though because if you wait until everyone is back at school, all jobs will probably already be gone.

3) In order to find other openings in the areas surrounding your college, you go online to Snagajob to see what else is available. These will be part time and hourly jobs that should be a good fit for you.

The best advice in 2011 if you are looking for good jobs for college students is to drop everything and get out there pounding the pavement THE MINUTE YOU ARRIVE! Put as much time as you can up front in your effort to get hired because if you wait it might be too late.

President Obama got voted into office by a wave of people wanting change. Many of them were first time voters and younger voters who bought into his vision of hope and change. Well, so far that change hasn’t worked out for anyone looking for work.

You are spending a LOT of money to get your degree, all in the hopes that it will lead to a better job or at least SOME job. But if there aren’t jobs to get you through college and there aren’t any good jobs after you graduate, what will you do then? A degree is worthless if there isn’t someone to hire you when you get out!

When President Obama was sworn into office in January 2009 the unemployment rate was over 7%. Now more than TWO AND A HALF YEARS LATER, unemployment is over 9%. That is NOT progress and NOT the kind of change we need. Apparently Obama has been working on jobs all the time but things are just getting worse. How long do we give him until we admit he doesn’t know how to make things better?

One of the best ways to get good at something is by doing it and practicing it. Something like a job interview is no different and that is why every one you go to is valuable experience, even if you don’t get the job.

I have a friend who has gone to many interviews for jobs she had no interest in! When I asked why she spent all that time interviewing for jobs she didn’t even want, she told me it was for the experience. You never know what questions will be asked and every interview you show up for, the more practice you get answering the wide array of questions thrown at you. Believe me, one bad answer to a question you never anticipated can turn a whole interview into a downward spiral.

That is why you should never turn down a job interview. Too many job seekers are lazy these days and hope to get a job by doing little more than filling out applications online. Sending out resumes and cover letters by email and applying to things online has almost gotten too easy. Many people looking for work treat the job hunt like email spammers do: the more you send out, the better your odds of someone being interested. Jobs for college students and graduates are out there but you have to work harder than that to get them.

Another thing you can do to get better at job interviews are to record yourself with video. Everyone has or knows someone with a video camera and you should use it to your advantage. It has never been easier to see for yourself exactly what you look and sound like in an interview.

Have a friend prepare five to ten questions and then sit down with you for the interview. Being able to watch yourself in action may reveal some things that need to be worked on that you weren’t aware of. We all have an idea of what we think we sound and look like but when we see ourselves on camera, it’s not always as good as we think. Video taping practice job interviews is a great way to polish your style and give you a better shot at impressing a recruiter or hiring manager.

If you somehow have the ability to offer your services for free, in other words get an unpaid internship, you might be able to turn that into a paid job down the road. This idea is obviously not for everyone as many won’t have the finances to do it and will need a real job that pays. But remember, you have just spent four (or more) years in college where you weren’t getting paid so if you can somehow afford to do it a bit longer, the gamble might pay off.

In today’s economy, you sometimes have to really go out of your way to get noticed to get a job. Just having a college degree doesn’t mean as much as it once did and many employers are wanting experience as much as an education from their prospective employees. That means you might have to be creative to get hired and working for free is a creative idea.

Getting your foot in the door of any company is the hardest part, as you have probably found out. If you are willing to take an internship to do that, even if it pays nothing, at least you will have gotten in the door. From that point on, it is up to you to impress everyone at the company and show them what a great person and worker you are.

Before you take any unpaid internship that you hope will lead to a job, it is best to ask up front if that is a possibility. There is no use working for free somewhere that has zero intension of hiring you. Asking whether an internship could lead to a job is a reasonable question and no employer should take offense at it. They should understand that you will need a paying job at some point and if they don’t, then that is probably not the right company for you anyway.

Good jobs for college students and graduates are harder than ever to come by and it is unfortunate that many in your age group are having such a difficult time. It just might be that you will have to sacrifice a bit longer before you land that first job and if you have to work for free for a while to make that happen, it could be worth it.

College students (and prospective ones) in 2011 have many difficult decisions and one of the most important ones is figuring out how much they can afford for schooling. Tuitions are at an all time high and that means a large percentage of students have to borrow money if they want to get that college degree. But aren’t student loans the good kind of debt?

When you are 18 to 21 years old you don’t have a lot of life experience. You don’t have experience with jobs, earning money, saving money, and anything else to do with money. That is why you are an easy target for credit card companies and loan officers. They want you to borrow money but you might not fully understand how hard it is to pay it back. You probably are too young to comprehend what being in debt is really like and how much it can hurt you and change your life.

You might be told that student loans are “good debt”, as though there is such a thing. You see, they will tell you that buying a $2,000 flat screen would be bad debt because that would be totally frivolous but borrowing $20,000 (or more) is an “investment” in your future and that is the good kind of debt. You might also be told that everyone gets loans and it is totally normal to graduate with debt.

Dont believe it.

Don’t be talked into and persuaded into things you don’t understand.

Don’t end up like this girl having to put up a website asking for donations because she is $200,000 in debt.

Don’t be fooled by the “good debt” argument. A college degree might be worthwhile and even important but you have to consider the price. At some point it costs to much and that number is different for each person. You see, we all are in different financial positions and we all will get different jobs that pay different amounts.

Are you going to become a doctor? Okay, you will need those degrees and you will have to (most likely) graduate with debt but hopefully you will be able to repay them because doctors make quite a bit of money.

Are you going to be a teacher? You will also need a degree but you better not graduate with too much debt because teachers don’t make a lot.

There are THOUSANDS of professions like teaching that don’t pay a whole lot and you need to figure out ways to get your degree (or don’t get one at all) without ending up in so much debt that it will take you 10 to 30 years to pay off.

You might have to start out at community college for the first two years to save money. You might have to live at home rather than in a dorm. You might have to go to a state college rather than a more expensive out of state one. Whatever you have to do, you need to realize that debt is NOT good and you want to graduate with as LITTLE of it as possible.

Don’t let people talk you into borrowing huge amounts of money to go to college because you will regret it later and then it will be too late. With college costing so much now, many students are making financial decisions that will impact them for years to come and many are going into so much debt that their lives will be adversely altered. Be smart about it and ask for advice from people you trust and who know what they are talking about. And when in doubt, sometimes it is better to hold off or do nothing.

Unlike high school and college where you just signed up for the classes you wanted to take (maybe you had to earn your way into some of them), the real world is much different. It is cutthroat out there and you are soon going to be thrown right into the mix.

The High Unemployment Issue

Most college students who will soon be graduating should be well aware of the national unemployment rate of 8.9%. What are their chances of getting a job with the limited work history they have? What kind of job will they realistically be able to get and what will it pay?

These questions are prompting many students to consider graduate school instead. They figure they can put off the pain of looking for,and maybe not getting, a job a bit longer. With more education under their belt they should be more employable in a year or two when they look for a job and the economy might be doing better then as well. But is this really a good choice, especially if you are doing it just to avoid the job crunch right now?

Graduate School Is Not Always An Asset

First of all, the more educated you are may NOT necessarily help you in your search for a job now or at any time. If all you have ever done is go to school, many employers may prefer to hire job candidates that have real world and real job experience. Just because you have proven you can be a student does NOT prove you can be a good employee.

Then there is the cost issue: piling on more years of student loans and increasing your debt will just mean that it will take that much longer to dig out from under it. Remember, those student loans are not going to go away and it really sucks (excuse me) to have to pay those things back when you are well into your 30′s or even 40′s.

Graduate school can be beneficial if you have a plan and know that it can ultimately help you get a job or get a higher salary. But now days many people get jobs first and go to graduate school later on. After they have some of that valuable job experience on their resume and a clear idea of what career path they want to pursue, they then go to grad school to increase their chances.

Employers Always Like Experience

The most important thing to think about is the fact that employers ALWAYS like experience. The more you have of it the better. Going to grad school right after you graduate college will, in most cases, limit the amount of real world job experience you will be able to get. Being overeducated is not good either and may actually sometimes  hurt your chances of being hired.

Finding jobs for college graduates in 2011 is not going to be easy or fun, that is for sure. You probably won’t get your dream job or the job you really want but going to graduate school might not be the best choice either. It might actually end up hurting you by putting you more in debt without having gained any real advantage. So think about it carefully: either way it’s a tough decision.