Cambridge graduate can't get a job.

katebl

Might it help to send out your CV omitting your qualifications and see if you get any better response? Just put the bare minimum if they are requirements for the position and otherwise leave them off altogether?

bristol_pilot

Chomeur wrote: »

- at my school I was the only person to get the A and S level results that I got, so where all these people come from I don't know.
.

Because these exams are considerably easier than they were 20 years ago !

Uncertain

bristol_pilot wrote: »

Because these exams are considerably easier than they were 20 years ago !

Quite!

I also went to a "very good school" (30 + years ago) which prided itself on exam results and the number of pupils getting Oxbridge places. However, back then only a tiny minority got straight As. I wouldn't mind betting pretty well every pupil at the school does now!

Maybe the standard of teaching has increased to near perfection - but then again................

dave4545454

Uncertain wrote: »

Quite!

I also went to a "very good school" (30 + years ago) which prided itself on exam results and the number of pupils getting Oxbridge places. However, back then only a tiny minority got straight As. I wouldn't mind betting pretty well every pupil at the school does now!

Maybe the standard of teaching has increased to near perfection - but then again................

so very true. the local betting shop won't even let me put a bet on the GCSE and A level results being a record high because they are every single year. total dumbing down in education.

Chomeur

katebl wrote: »

Might it help to send out your CV omitting your qualifications and see if you get any better response? Just put the bare minimum if they are requirements for the position and otherwise leave them off altogether?

Actually that is how I got my first job out of University. After a lot of rejections I finally left a few exams and some extra-curricular achievements off my c.v. It did seem to work. So I suppose I'm being stubborn in not doing that now. But I find it so depressing to do this. And I suppose I still believe that there must be jobs out there that will really suit me, and that by downplaying myself I risk ending up in a job which I'll be frustrated in (again). There's a lot of appeal in not working compared to working in a job in which I'm very frustrated.

And as for exams getting easier, I'm firmly of the view that they must have done. Maybe employers recognise this too unfortunately, and that counts against me.

collingbone614

I agree with everyone who has suggested 'taming down' your CV to get a job if necessary. I know it sounds completely !!!!!! and backward, but I got desperate and began to experiment with completely lying: I left my degree off entirely (I got a 2:1 in politics albeit from an ex-polytechnic) and wrote that I had worked for my dad's small business in as a computer administrator for those three years after I left uni. Get creative here and think about your family: do you know anyone who owns a small business and can give you a 'referrence'? Immediately after I introduced this tactic I began to get job offers and my first job had an annual salary 18,600 for staring at a screen all day not doing very much for 18 months - whilst it was boring I earned plenty to save for a mortgage deposit and now have my own house.

When I began to look for better jobs I reintroduced my degree, interests, and other things that I felt were actually holding me back. I found that now that I had 18 months actual real work experience, employers were far more receptive. I now work in local government doing something more interesting for the 9-5.

Basically, I advocate lying like hell. When I started work at my new job I just plain didn't tell anyone I had a degree, which was sometimes uncomfortable because people can pick up that you're an educated person. It might help if you try to learn about boring trash that normal people like, go and watch Big Brother, listen to top of the pops, X-Factor - try to erase any sense of individuality, flair, or creativity from your life. Become a mind-numbing, zombie-like office drone with no hopes, aspirations and dreams. After a while you can kind of lose yourself in the mindless casual sex, subsidised lager at office nights out, bad coffee, pie charts, the slow, inward turning sense of depression and worthlessness that you can never get rid of no matter how you scrub in the shower.

matt10001

so what is you degree in? Just because you gone to cambridge doesn't mean you are going to get a job, employers want someone who can hit the ground running.

I didn't go to oxbridge I went to a university in wales and my workload was alot, I had 29 exams all in all in three years and normally 2 assignments for every modules and I did 12 modules every year.

Chomeur

omnirife wrote: »

I agree with everyone who has suggested 'taming down' your CV to get a job if necessary. I know it sounds completely !!!!!! and backward, but I got desperate and began to experiment with completely lying: I left my degree off entirely (I got a 2:1 in politics albeit from an ex-polytechnic) and wrote that I had worked for my dad's small business in as a computer administrator for those three years after I left uni. Get creative here and think about your family: do you know anyone who owns a small business and can give you a 'referrence'? Immediately after I introduced this tactic I began to get job offers and my first job had an annual salary 18,600 for staring at a screen all day not doing very much for 18 months - whilst it was boring I earned plenty to save for a mortgage deposit and now have my own house.

When I began to look for better jobs I reintroduced my degree, interests, and other things that I felt were actually holding me back. I found that now that I had 18 months actual real work experience, employers were far more receptive. I now work in local government doing something more interesting for the 9-5.

Basically, I advocate lying like hell. When I started work at my new job I just plain didn't tell anyone I had a degree, which was sometimes uncomfortable because people can pick up that you're an educated person. It might help if you try to learn about boring trash that normal people like, go and watch Big Brother, listen to top of the pops, X-Factor - try to erase any sense of individuality, flair, or creativity from your life. Become a mind-numbing, zombie-like office drone with no hopes, aspirations and dreams. After a while you can kind of lose yourself in the mindless casual sex, subsidised lager at office nights out, bad coffee, pie charts, the slow, inward turning sense of depression and worthlessness that you can never get rid of no matter how you scrub in the shower.

Thanks, only just seen your excellent response. I really appreciate your advice, but I think I might be happier as I am than putting up with all that. For one thing I don't even own a TV to watch those programs (out of choice). And I'm not running out of money...

7891368

You're not above a low paid job, you're unemployed.

Places which you 'would like to' work would surely rather you were working than on JSA, for however many months it takes you to get a job?

Duncombe

My sister has just come out of Cambridge with a 1st! She did alot of part-time work before she went to Uni (wasnt alowed to whilst studying) so should be more than employable.

However, she got herself pregnant 4 months before she finished. Not sure if that makes her smarter or more stupid than others...