from employers through their LinkedIn accounts. She reminds students to join alumni Facebook and LinkedIn pages too, because fellow alumni can also be helpful resources. Through networking, social networking, writing blogs, and creating their own websites, many students are forging their own opportunities. When alumnus Patrick Boyle and his friend Megan Dermody from Susquehanna University, both English majors, graduated in 2011 without serious writing portfolios, they spent the better part of that summer applying for jobs and not finding work.
and culture magazine. Two months later, writing five articles a week on top of part-time jobs became too much work to maintain. “I suggested that we switch to a print quarterly magazine, which would allow us to bring on more writers and photographers and give us new exposure,” says Boyle. The editors launched a two-week fundraising campaign on Idiegogo.com and broke their $2,000 goal in less than seven days. They printed two issues and are working on their third. “We haven’t made a profit yet— everyone has essentially volunteered their time and effort—but we break
Cindy Mota ’12 gives a presentation
For Cindy Mota ’12, another graduate of the program, becoming a financial planner took hard work, sacrifice, and dedication. Mota, born in the Dominican Republic, was the first in her family to attend college. She was one of several William Paterson graduates interviewed for a June 25, 2012 cover story in The Hispanic Outlook in Higher Education about the high demand for Hispanic financial planning majors. Upon graduation, Mota was hired as a high net worth ($1 million) client service specialist for Vanguard, the largest mutual fund company in the United States. “About 80 percent of positions are found through the ‘hidden job market,’ which includes meeting people in a chosen field and obtaining jobs through websites like LinkedIn,” says Nauta. It’s not unusual, she notes, for students to receive job offers directly
W pag e
16
sixteen
Megan Dermody, Nadia Nieves ’11, Patrick Boyle ’11, and Dhruvin Dave ’11, and their new venture, Lamplighter, an alternative music and culture magazine
Sitting in his backyard one summer night, Boyle suggested to his friends (Dermody, and fellow William Paterson graduates Dhruvin Dave ’11 and Nadia Nieves ’11) that they start their own magazine. By October, they launched Lamplighter, an online alternative music
even, which keeps us afloat,” says Boyle. “From this whole experience, I learned a lot about writing for deadlines, managing and communicating with staff, and experienced the real struggle of print media.” So what does this mean for Boyle’s future? “Honestly, I’m a poet, working
Snapshot of the Class of 2009 How did the Class of 2009 fare in the job market? According to the 2009 New Alumni Survey (the most recent data on record), which was administered one year later, of those who responded: n
81
percent of graduates were employed
n
59
percent were employed full-time, 22 percent part-time
n
Almost
n
Nine of ten alumni were employed in New Jersey
n
More than two-thirds of respondents said their jobs were very or somewhat related to their majors
20 percent were enrolled in post-baccalaureate programs