College graduation season is always a happy time. But many students are even more buoyant than usual this year, thanks to a job market for new college graduates that’s finally lifting off after years of recession.

Jobs are “surging for new college graduates” National Public Radio proclaimed in a recent story. “Best Job Market Yet for Millennials,” an Economist story was headlined.

“The conversation about jobs when my sister graduated in 2012 was completely different than the conversation is now,” says Caroline Villanova, a UVM environmental studies major from Chelmsford, Massachusetts, who started a new job as a project manager and environmental analyst at the Vermont Department of Environmental Conservation in March, while finishing up her last semester.          

“There are a lot more opportunities and less of a focus on, you need to get this job immediately because you are not going to find another one like it. Now it’s like, if you don't get this one, there actually are more to apply to.”

Villanova saw jobs that looked like a good match for her every time she checked Catamount Job Links, the online job listing compiled by UVM’s Career Center. But it was an internship with the Department of Environmental Conservation offered through her academic unit, the Rubenstein School of Environment and Natural Resources, that helped her land the job there. The Rubenstein School has a “great relationship with the department,” Villanova says, part of a concerted the school and the university have made in recent years to form relationships with employers who offer internships, which often lead to job offers. 

Octavio Araujo, a mechanical engineering major from Weston, Florida, who’s starting a job as a structural design engineer at Boeing in July, has noticed a change in atmosphere during the time he’s been at UVM. “I remember when I came in to college four years ago, everybody was talking about how hard it was to get a job,” he says. “I don't feel the same tension or pressure now.”

Hard work in school and during the job hunt – and leathery skin to withstand inevitable rejections – are still required, Araujo says, but “the hard-working colleagues I have don't have to worry about finding a job."

More openings than applicants

Susan Hughes, an associate professor of accounting in UVM’s Grossman School of Business, isn’t surprised that both her undergraduate accounting majors and master of accountancy students, who've studied at UVM an additional year, are doing well in the job market.

Among the half dozen Vermont accounting firms who sent a representative to UVM’s first ever accounting firm breakfast, held in early May, “the consensus around the table was that firms have more openings than they have qualified applicants,” Hughes said, a ratio that also applies to other geographic areas, like Boston, she said.

All of her master's students have positions, Hughes said, and “we’re also seeing a hot market for students with just with an undergraduate accounting degree.”

Judging by the number of employers in all fields who came to UVM to recruit this year, the economy has turned a corner, says Jill Hoppenjans, employee relations coordination in UVM's Career Center.

Strong employer demand led UVM to hold four careers fairs in 2015/2016, she said, up from two in prior years.

“We keep selling out, and it seems bad to turn away employers, so we had to build our capacity,” she says. “Employers love coming to our events. They love our students; we get really positive feedback from all of the evaluations.”

John Marchinkoski, a history major from Warrington, Vermont, sees “no shortage of positions” but also no shortage of applicants, thanks to online job sites like Indeed and LinkedIn, which make it easy to apply.

To avoid the crowd, Marchinkoski worked through a recruiting agency to land a job as a background investigator at CACD, a security consulting firm in metro Washington, D.C. The reading, writing, research and interviewing skills he acquired in his major were a good match for the job, which will require him to vet applicants to top federal and military positions for security clearance. 

“I think as long as you stay focused and you apply and are willing to take no for an answer and keep going, there are jobs for history majors,” says Marchinkoski, who sees his new job as a good jumping off point on a career journey that is still taking shape. 

Hannah Riney, a psychology major from Wilton, Connecticut, will start a job as a community integration specialist at Northeast Family Institute in South Burlington, Vermont, working with troubled youth, a job she views as good starting point for a potential career in counseling.  As mental illness becomes less stigmatized, mental health treatment is “more of an option for people,” she says. “These kinds of jobs are needed; I see a lot of variety of jobs out there.”

Patrick Mathon, a finance major from Southborough, Massachusetts, will start a two-year rotational training program in General Electric’s highly competitive Financial Management Program in July, spending six-month stints at units of GE's Power division. He'll then get strong consideration for a permanent position with the company. 

Like other students, Mathon credits UVM will helping him make the most of the improving job market. 

In the finance major, “professors come from a wide array of backgrounds, so you get many different perspectives,” he says. “There are tons of different finance courses, and your professors go out of their way to find time to make sure you understand.”

“We’re definitely in a more comfortable place now,” he says. “The recovery, combined with what UVM has to offer – I think we're in a good place.”

PUBLISHED

05-18-2016