to think young people are being terribly treated at the moment

[seades]

My brother graduated from a RG uni in the summer and has found getting a graduate job very difficult. At the moment he is interning for free at a PR firm (which is what he wants to do) in the day and working in a bar in the evening and weekends (whenever he can get shifts). Most weeks he is working 60-70 hours a week and in return he can barely afford to eat and pay the rent in his house which is an absolute dump. I was talking to a friend today and she said that this sort of thing is common place and that it teaches young people the value of hard work. AIBU to think that she is talking rubbish, this sort of demands on young people are unacceptable. and that young people are getting a terribly raw deal at the moment

Mrs It's not just "trendy" jobs though. In the area I come from you can't get any job. Where I am now it's mostly part time work and tbh, the wage you get down here for full time in a lot of circumstances isn't enough to live on independently.

Been their, done that, got the T-Shirt!

I also did no pay work experience for about 18 months & had to work on a weekend. I did this whilst I was pregnant & went straight back to work! I worked my bloody ass off! Although to be fair it was worth it!

Hope your brother gets something!

YANBU

The organisation I work for has started to have interns and I have refused point blank to take one on until they are paid. They want to make it policy that everybody working in my role in a department has an intern. The fight needs to happen from both sides - grads need to say no so that it stops being the norm and individuals in companies need to say no to their bosses and refuse to have unpaid labour.

A fair wage isn't too much to ask.

I got my first job after graduation from a charity I had volunteered for one day a week in my third year. I would definitely recommend that approach as you get to develop experience but it is on your own terms and doesn't involve working full time hours for no pay at a time when your student loan has stopped and you have no income.

squeamish - I have refused point blank to take one on until they are paid.

I admire your stance.

I agree 100pc with this post. I hate internships on principle, to me they reinforce the divide between 'haves' and 'have nots' as some people can't afford to not be paid for their work and so lose out on these opportunities to gain work experience, possible mentoring etc. As someone else has pointed out, these are often only offered to those with family/friends connections anyway.

To me, internships are the work of the devil. And the same goes for other pseudo jobs, things like 'zero hours contracts' things that offer no job security and an unequal work relationship to the severe detriment of the (usually young) worker.

I am amazed that young people are so calm actually. Given the way things are pitted against them, I think that they should be climbing the walls with fury. We are storing up enormous trouble for ourselves for the future as a community.

YANBU at all.

The people who talk about the value of hard work are usually the ones who walked straight into graduate jobs in better times, and never had to work for free or very low wage.

I can't see much of an incentive for kids to work hard nowadays. Work hard or don't work hard, you'll not be able to afford a house either way. Even a doctor would struggle to buy a house in my city. It is madness.

YANBU. My DSD is 21, earns £21000 a year and still can't afford to leave home, well she could leave home but wouldn't be able to feed herself after paying rent and bills. I left home when I was 16, I think it's harder for young people now than it's ever been.

yanbu. im 25, graduted a few years ago and have NEVER managed to get in the sector that I want even though I have a very good degree from a well respected university. I will probably never own a property and I most likely will never get in to the career that I worked so bloody hard for. But I will keep trying.

Maryz I see that too. We are losing some of our brightest youngsters. They can get a much better standard of living in other countries so who can blame them?

YANBU! When I graduated I applied for any jobs that were going, regardless of whether they were 'trendy' or not. I was unemployed for five months before getting a job at my current organisation.

I am now working in a different department to the one in which I started, in an area in which I want to pursue a career. However, it is not well paid and I will have to do a post-grad in order to progress, which seems to be the case in most jobs in my industry. I'm lucky enough to have been left some money by a family member that enables me to do this but with most post-grads costing the best part of £10,000 there are many people not able to do this!

I think part of the problem is that my parents were from the generation that went to uni in the 60s (with no tuition fees and a maintenance grant) and walked straight into professional jobs after graduation, in my mum's case teaching.

It was drummed into me (and most of my friends) from an early age that we would go to university and do an academic degree, and that would be enough to secure a good job. Anyone from my background (lefty Guardian-reading middle-class) who wasn't going to uni was deemed A Failure, or that's the distinct impression that 17-year-old me got. To her credit my mum will now admit that she was quite naive in her assumptions and probably put too much pressure on me.

And yes, it's good to learn a skilled trade and roofers, plumbers etc are professional, decent, lucrative careers. But the key word is skill. Not everyone has the skills necessary to pursue these careers, and suggesting that they do is quite devaluing. Why shouldn't those of a more academic and less practical leaning be able to expect a fulfilling job for a half-way decent wage??

And yeah, working in the meeja may be seen as trendy, but people are always going to want to watch telly and read the papers aren't they?? So it's a bloody good thing that there are young people who want to keep the industry going...!

I am sorry Lonelynessie that you have faced such an uphill struggle. Yes please keep trying to get to where you want to be, you never know what lies ahead so I hope that the opportunities you deserve come to you.

It is disheartening that there seems to be so little respect for education/qualifications. I have a professional qualification, however my last employer did not even ask to see my qualification certificate, despite it being directly relevant to my job role. However, I had to produce satisfactory references going back years.

It is this kind of attitude and approach - valuing 'experience' over proven ability, insisting that employees 'hit the ground running' rather than being willing to invest time and effort in nurturing them and ending up with potentially a more effective - and loyal - employee in the longer term - which particularly disadvantages young people even the well educated ones. Why is it that an opportunity even to begin to build a career in a chosen field is too much to ask?

The problem is that degrees have become really devalued. Too many people going to university who wouldn't have done 30 years ago. Too many mickey mouse degrees.

But for other young people learning a skill, craft or trade in areas more mundane then trendy can reap very high rewards with hard work and the right attitude

I agree with this. Even if they move into white collar work/professions having a trade is always helpful for the cashflow.

DH is a police officer, he also does gardening work for a bit of extra cash. He's an electrical engineer by trade so if he ever lost his job he would have something to fall back on.

I am also in the police but am a patissier by trade. I still work in hotels for extra income and run a cake decorating business. Again, if I was made redundant I would find work very easily as I have kept up my trade skills.

We will push encourage DD to do the same.

I'm not sure the rise in IT sector/media jobs make up for the manufacturing crash, which before used to create blue-collar vacancies and is now creating generational unemployment.

The problem seems to be now that more young people are graduates, there's fewer entry-level jobs for them. I don't know what Blair was thinking trying to push 50% of young people into Uni, but it isn't working. He should have concentrated on building up industry and engineering, which will also help long-term economic growth.

Internships should be treated like apprenticeships, be paid at least £15k a year equivalent and be linked to real vacancies.

I dont agree that many of there are many mickey mouse degrees. IMO the problem is that there are too many very vocational degrees where there are few actual job opportunities at the end.

An example is BSc Forensic Science - there are loads of these courses. Looking at a few examples the content looks quite academic. The entry requirements are similar to other science degrees.

Problem is... just how many forensic science jobs are there each year? My understanding is precious few.

Also, my understand also is that most employers are looking for a first degree in a mainstream science with specialisation at postgraduate level.

To my mind the problems with the highly vocational degrees is that they are 'dress-up' degrees. You get to spend 3 years studying to be a forensic scientist/animal carer/whatever but in fact you arent actually qualified to carry out these roles. Either as with forensic scientist you are under qualified or as with animal carer you are over qualified, under experienced and competing with people who would happily do the job for free.

I dunno, must depend on your chosen career path, DD did a Maths degree followed by a PGCE and walked straight into a teaching job ( high school Maths), as have all her Uni/ NQT friends. She could have taken her pick of dozens of jobs.

Conversely, her best friend is a social worker and can only find short term contracts.

DH is struggling to find a couple of Electrical/Engineering apprentices for his firm, you would think they'd be queuing round the block for an apprenticeship paying £21k for 2 years then £28k when qualified.

Especially as all the forensic suppliers I know are laying off FSs by the truckload.

That is saddening ChristmasCareeristBitchNigel, students are going to graduate with degrees which may well have good content but the title of the degree is going to put employers off unless they actually want a FS.

That is going to be £27k plus all the other costs plus 3 years all down the drain.

The problem is that students are being badly advised as to which courses to go for.

I can see similar happening with Biomedical Sciences courses. Basically these courses are pumping out lab rats for hospital path labs. Problem is that the technology is moving on meaning that very soon the vast majority of path lab jobs will be for technicians only with the testing being done by machine.

The Mickey Mouse degree debate annoys me as it is usually aimed at entirely the wrong targets – media studies and so on. In reality many of these degrees are actually very broadly applicable and can prepare students for all sorts of careers – PR and TV work but also public sector (if there are any jobs left there ), teaching, general management, marketing, communications, arts and heritages, sales, the list goes on. WorrySighWorrySigh is quite right to say that the real problem here is incredibly narrow and (usually) vocational degrees that lead to a very narrow range of jobs and are going to be very little use in applying for lots of more general jobs. For instance, events management is now hugely popular, but if you look at a typical syllabus it’s relatively narrow – a student would be much better off doing a business/management degree and specialising in events management by doing a module or dissertation on it which would keep their options open.

At the really silly end, there are courses like Golf Management degrees – Birmingham, Bournemouth as well as highlands and Islands, Dundee offer this course. Surf and beach management was tried a few years ago but was then withdrawn as it suffered so much ridicule – unfortunately other such courses survive. The marketisation of HE has led to universities being pushed to develop new courses that serve niche markets to pull in more students, and this is the result.

It’s a poor look-out for young people who take these courses (desperately dragging this post back on topic) and to add insult to injury, they will then be sneered at by the government who supported changes in the system which encouraged the development of exactly this kind of course.

But surely you don't need a degree to do events management? I imagine it is all about experience, and contacts, best gained by actually working in the field. Same with business studies I reckon. I haven't needed a degree in it to set up my own business. And media studies, hmm, it seems to be just about discussing the sort of stuff your average decently educated educated person talks about down the pub anyway. Certainly my daughter's A level is.
I'm sure in the past, the number of degrees available was regulated, so you couldn't have too many pharmacists or teachers or doctors. Only the most able people got on the degrees and then were pretty much guaranteed a job at the end to reward their hard work.

YANBU at all.

I know a very large, well known and highly profitable company which would not be afloat without interns.

They take advantage of people desperate to go into their industry, offering them £10 a day in expenses to work in CENTRAL LONDON.

My friend has "interned" for them twice - the first time it took them 5 months to pay her the owed expenses (so it basically cost her money to work for them) The second time, they asked her if she wanted a second internship because they needed someone with her (very obscure) specialist skills!!!

They asked her a third time, but she told them that as they still hadn't paid her expenses and she had gone freelance, if they wanted her to work for them they had to hire her... surprisingly they didn't take her up on the offer.

Never been to UNI, but did realised after 18 months of a child care course that the job market was fierce for TA ( what I wanted to get out of it)

I made a descion then I would qualify at level 2 and make my evening job, my perment job.

I do think young people should look at the job market before going to uni.

The events manager at my hotel is dire. She has no clue what to ask, how to deal with clients, how to head off problems, how to say "that is not possible" and then leaves the experienced staff to deal with the fall out.

Plus she thinks she's God's gift because she has a degree in event management. Heaven knows what she learnt on it, she can't even write a function sheet without missing half the information off.

I would not mind this if she acknowledged and learnt from her mistakes or acknowledged that she is surrounded by people with significantly more experience than her. No, she just yawns on about her degree from god knows where crappy university. Like anyone is impressed !