Spring Break
OP-ED: Desperately seeking work
by Crystal Truelove
Op-Ed | 5/20/08
Posted online at 6:32 AM EST on 5/20/08
The two callbacks I did receive both resulted in personal interviews. It took me weeks of maddeningly frustrating failed attempts to contact the woman who gave me the first interview. When I finally had her on the phone, she told me the job would be left unfilled due to budget cuts and that she was sorry for not getting back to me sooner.
The other job interview, for a position as a greeter at a health clinic, went well, and I was asked back for a second interview with-the Board. The Board's main concern was that I might not be able to handle the job due to my lack of medical background. I assured them I could learn the job, and quickly. I volunteered to learn Russian-a local target population for the clinic. They said, "No, thank you."
My Brandeis degrees are in anthropology with a specialization in conflict resolution, so why was I begging for an opportunity to make $11 an hour in an unrelated field? Because I wasn't as employable as I'd imagined. The anthropology jobs I found were not local, not unless I'd studied archaeology, which I hadn't. The conflict resolution positions I found were for volunteers, and I needed to pay off my student loans. I widened my search field and considered other jobs, like a secretarial position at a hydroelectric dam, manager of vacation and sick leave for a school district and a hospital X-ray technician. Responses from all of these? Big fat nothing.
I was nearing panic in September when I received a general e-mail to Brandeis alumni. It said something to the effect of "Hey! We want to know how great your summer was. Tell us about your new job and how Brandeis helped you get it!" I replied instantly and with passion-you should never do this-saying how awful my life was, how I was on the brink of catastrophe and beginning to think attending Brandeis was a giant mistake. However, my outlook soon improved.
I was hired in October, and then promoted in November. I love my job; I have a great supervisor, great benefits and a flexible schedule. It's not anthropology or conflict resolution, but some of my student skills do apply. Right now I'm using my Brandeis-sharpened skills of organization, discipline and the ability to read tiresome things and get the main points out of them.
So it turns out that a Brandeis education is good for something after all, even if it did take me five months to figure out what. Besides, looking back on my jobless stretch, it doesn't seem so bad. Things seemed bleak for a while, but I need not have worried. If nothing else, I got to be unemployed during the five best-weathered months of the year.
The other job interview, for a position as a greeter at a health clinic, went well, and I was asked back for a second interview with-the Board. The Board's main concern was that I might not be able to handle the job due to my lack of medical background. I assured them I could learn the job, and quickly. I volunteered to learn Russian-a local target population for the clinic. They said, "No, thank you."
My Brandeis degrees are in anthropology with a specialization in conflict resolution, so why was I begging for an opportunity to make $11 an hour in an unrelated field? Because I wasn't as employable as I'd imagined. The anthropology jobs I found were not local, not unless I'd studied archaeology, which I hadn't. The conflict resolution positions I found were for volunteers, and I needed to pay off my student loans. I widened my search field and considered other jobs, like a secretarial position at a hydroelectric dam, manager of vacation and sick leave for a school district and a hospital X-ray technician. Responses from all of these? Big fat nothing.
I was nearing panic in September when I received a general e-mail to Brandeis alumni. It said something to the effect of "Hey! We want to know how great your summer was. Tell us about your new job and how Brandeis helped you get it!" I replied instantly and with passion-you should never do this-saying how awful my life was, how I was on the brink of catastrophe and beginning to think attending Brandeis was a giant mistake. However, my outlook soon improved.
I was hired in October, and then promoted in November. I love my job; I have a great supervisor, great benefits and a flexible schedule. It's not anthropology or conflict resolution, but some of my student skills do apply. Right now I'm using my Brandeis-sharpened skills of organization, discipline and the ability to read tiresome things and get the main points out of them.
So it turns out that a Brandeis education is good for something after all, even if it did take me five months to figure out what. Besides, looking back on my jobless stretch, it doesn't seem so bad. Things seemed bleak for a while, but I need not have worried. If nothing else, I got to be unemployed during the five best-weathered months of the year.
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