If you were in your 2nd year of a humanities degree - what would you be doing now to

[TheLibrocubicularist]

Secure a job upon graduation. Especially if you didn't have a career in mind. What skills would you be acquiring that would make you more employable.

That would have been me, a thousand or so years ago.
Look hard at exactly what careers entail, back then it was banking, retail, teaching, Civil Service, maybe armed forces.
I would suggest trying to get work experience in as many sectors as possible, from Vulcanology to Hospital Administration (depending on the degree structure).
See if DC can gather up First Aid qualifications and a DBS check. Both of those are really useful. Also driving, as others have said, if she can't already. Good luck!

There are way too many law graduates, the SQE is very difficult and you only get a maximum of three attempts which means that those who have done a law degree rather than a conversion are now at an advantage since they will have studied law for longer.

DH & I both have history degrees. He works as a health & safety professional & I work doing project management in the voluntary sector.

history has a lot of transferable skills for the workplace. Ability to read a large amount of documents around an issue and pick out what matters, ability to synthesise arguments for and against a position, ability to identify evidence within documents, ability to look at behaviours and motivation.

personally unless she loves working ludicrous hours for limited money, I wouldn’t look at hospitality for a career. I worked in a shop all through uni & the one thing it taught me was that I never wanted it as a career!

Yeah she is going to have to do further studies to be honest, teaching PGCE, law conversion or a masters in history/area of interest

The obvious route for a history degree is into journalism, the skills around reviewing sources for accuracy, judging reliability, writing clear arguments.

But any work experience which demonstrates that she is committed, reliable, good team player is helpful

I did a history degree. Looking back with what I know now, I definitely agree with other posters to try to get internships and work experience and to start looking at that before her final year.

But really, if I could have a word with my younger self, I'd make use of all the facilities of the university while I was there. As well as my studies, I could have done many IT courses, learnt a language, made extensive use of the careers service etc etc. All at no extra cost.

I was pretty involved with a couple of societies, but at the time, I was too young and inexperienced to really know how to present that as something valuable on my cv, so you might need to help or signpost her on that kind of thing.

My first degree wasn't Humanities but something along those lines. I did a summer internship and voluntary placement and some unrelated volunteering plus worked part time and researched next steps (two kind of obverse routes, picked one in the end). I also went to a lot of extra talks and lectures at the uni for extra knowledge.

She can do pretty much anything with a History degree.

Now is the time to start thinking about what interests and motivates her, and researching careers connected to that, then getting work experience placements, lining up summer jobs, or doing some volunteering for charities connected to her interests.

I did a similar degree. I also didn’t know what I wanted to do at that point in my degree but I knew what things interested me enough to want to explore them as possibilities. I spent my summers working with kids in a summer camp, worked part time during term time doing alumni fundraising for the university, did work experience at various arts organisations and joined lots of societies to try out different things I was interested in like journalism and theatre directing. I also kept up my foreign language A level by taking the free language classes offered, in case I wanted to work abroad.

I kept my options open, built a good CV and also a good amount of contacts so I had people to ask for advice and help, and also for references. This all meant I got a job immediately on graduation - in the Arts/Theatre industry, which I enjoyed very much, but didn’t pay very well, so I trained as a teacher eventually. I am still teaching 10+ years on and I love it. I did also work abroad so those free language classes were invaluable!

If I can give one piece of advice - once she leaves uni, she will never have access to the amount of free opportunities to educate herself and try out new hobbies and interests again - so she needs to make the most of it. Take advantage of the free language classes, the extra lectures, the Q&As with professionals, the recruitment fairs, the taster sessions and so on. Universities offer so much beyond the academics that very few students actually appreciate and make use of.

I have a friend who is a Food and Beveridge Manager in a posh hotel chain. Worked their way up from a waitress and is on very good money. She has worked all over the world and gets great 'perks' when travelling thanks to the chain she works for. So there are well paid jobs in hospitality if she wants to be in the sector.

Could she volunteer for a charity in an admin position? Politics is another classic, but employers can fight shy of people they perceive as opinionated on their CV.

I agree about doing an Excel course - all the Office suite of tools to be honest. I'd also be looking at the certifications required in jobs she's looking at and perhaps doing one of those too.

I was a history grad, and my summer job was doing a paid research project for the university. If her course is anything like mine she's on low contact time, so a good degree of flex. I certainly wouldn't be going into retail for anything but money.

I now work in Data Governance, and have worked in project management.

Hospitality isn't a good career choice in my opinion, and I speak as someone with a degree in Hotel Management, but what it does give you is interpersonal skills and a bit of polish that others would die for!

If I were in your position, I'd be sending my dd off to be a chalet girl for the winter and working on a yacht or similar in the Summer, for a couple of years while she, in the nicest possible way, grew up a bit. Then I'd be encouraging her to do a more career related postgrad whether that be teaching, law or whatever. We expect our young people to make long term decisions when they're so young. Some know right from the start what they want to do, some like me didn't and they need time and most importantly support (something that I didn't get) to find their path. I wish her well!

Journalism or an adjacent corporate role such as communications. Corporate comms or employee comms/internal comms.

As @Ithinkitsimpressive said:

history has a lot of transferable skills for the workplace. Ability to read a large amount of documents around an issue and pick out what matters, ability to synthesise arguments for and against a position, ability to identify evidence within documents, ability to look at behaviours and motivation.

I’m a uni lecturer who’s a personal tutor. I’d recommend my students do a work placement or a gap year to explore things they might enjoy. There’s no point having a degree if you don’t really know what you have a passion for doing with your life.

Not everyone needs to come out of uni and into a job. Neither Dh or I did, or not a job we kept for very long anyway. But you do need to come out with a sense of who you are and what you enjoy doing.

I’d be looking to do a year out doing something that might interest them, combined with travel. Young people need to see the world and experience life beyond home and the university.

What was I doing in the second year of a humanities degree? Working on my extended essay, working part time (to pay the bills, not to find my vocation), partying.

Sleeping peacefully after a heavy night I imagine.

Perhaps attending lectures in the afternoon.

Law is a great option with a history degree but she'll need top grades and to be at a very good university. No need to switch to a law degree at all. If it's of interest she should be researching summer placements and doing some reading around the subject.

Civil service- she could be applying for an internship for this summer, I think. Very good experience for a fast stream application.

The first thing I would say is you can't do this for her. If she is asking for your help or advice that's one thing but don't be that parent otherwise.

Both my brother and husband did history at Russell group university - one works for civil service, the other is unemployed.

The job market is absolutely brutal right now.
Even badly paid hospitality positions as a wait staff are competitive with graduates applying. I really wouldn't pin a future graduate career on hospitality,- lots of antisocial hours for little money.

I would look through this list of top graduate employers, see if any appeal, have a more in depth look at what might be on their person spec : https://www.top100graduateemployers.com/

Have a think about whether she could consider something like Teach First or Frontline for social work.

I would make sure she does something this summer- ideally an internship but if not volunteering.
What's important is not necessarily what she does but what she gets out of it.
I knew a guy who squandered an opportunity of a year in industry for a top firm as they just coasted. Also known people though who were able to secure great jobs with no direct experience but volunteering- however they had a 'project' and delivered on it. Example being organising and promoting a fundraising summer fair.

I am currently on a history module of a humanities degree with the OU. I'm applying for a promotion at work into a policy area which I have no experience in and this has just given me a great idea for wording something in my personal statement!

Looking at the Civil Service fast stream is a good idea. So is working on IT skills. Every week at work we realise that Power BI could probably be useful but we can't find anyone who can use it.

Just to back this my husband with history degree definitely got his civil service job due to his Power BI skills!

The government fund some short 'coding' bootcamps https://www.skillsforcareers.education.gov.uk/pages/training-choice/skills-bootcamp

What is PowerBl?

When i Google it just showed me the powerball lottery

It's part of the Microsoft package and it turns data fromexcel or an Internet form into usable, visual data. If we saw it on a CV it would definitely stand out!

That's because power bi is shit rather than anyone not having the right skillset.

SQL is a good skill to have though.

🙄

We're close, we chat, bounce ideas off each other.

Getting a placement for the summer or - even better - planning a placement year or study abroad year.

I think this is the time to research what you want to do and then find relevant experience that might be necessary. If you want to be an archivist, for instance, you often need a year-ish of work experience(!) just to get on a masters. I’d say don’t just do stuff at random because it might come in handy, target your time.