Contrasting Employment Conditions Among College Graduates

In the severe ``employment war`` for college graduates, there is an obvious contrast between the prestigious college graduates and regional or low-class college graduates.

On one hand, graduates from prestigious colleges who can get jobs sometimes choose to be ``voluntarily unemployed`` waiting for a better position. On the other hand, low-class college graduates who want to work at any position, can not find a job due to the decreasing numbers of new positions and companies’ biased views.

Example: Lee (28) who graduated from Yonsei University’s business administration department in February, 1999, already quit two companies. Company he used to work was a large corporation and a bank with which many people envy, but their annual salary or long-term prospect did not satisfy Lee. He is preparing for the U.S. CFA (Chartered Financial Analyst) exam to get a job at a foreign bank or a consulting firm.

Kim (27) who went to a college in Chungbuk, majoring in electronic-communication engineering, is a ``Chuiup Chaesusang`` (one who had failed to get a job in the year of graduation). He has three certificates of qualification including a certificate on wireless communication facility. But comparing with Lee, Kim has no room for leisure. He said, ``Even though I send applications once every two weeks, I am not selected from the document review. I don’t care if it is a small company in rural region.``

The actual employment rate, excluding those who had joined military or went graduate schools, of last August and February graduates that Seoul National University revealed last month is 35 percent. Yet, according to the school employment information center, there are many job opportunities. Mee-Hye Choi, a worker at the center, said on 18th. ``Although there are many requests from small companies and venture enterprises, they don’t even have any interests.``

Hyung-Kyu Park, a director at Korea University’s employment support department, said, ``Many people among graduates who didn’t get a job seem to be people who opted to become ``voluntarily unemployed`` because they want to work at the 10 largest companies, foreign companies, or financial institutions.`` Lee (26) who graduated Korea University last August but preparing for entrance exams for a broadcasting company said, ``My friends who graduated with me also want to invest one or two years to get a job at where they want to work.``

In the meantime, for those who graduate from regional colleges, second campuses, or female students, the stories of the ``voluntary unemployed`` are luxurious. Although regional colleges says that their pure employment rate is about 50-60 percent but specialists says their numbers are exaggerated ones.

The Recruit, a magazine specialized on employment information, estimated that the actual employment rate for regional college graduates would be about 35 to 40 percent. As a matter of fact, an unnamed officer who is in charge of recruit in a regional college that had said their employment rate is 64 percent confessed that they included those who got temporary intern positions and one who was running an outdoor bar. He added that the rate for regular employment would be about 30 percent.

According to a survey for 500 job seekers who graduated college, done by Jobkorea (www.jobkorea.co.kr), A site specially designed for employment information, the situation is very serious. 25.1 percent of regional college graduates answered that they would work at any places regardless of salary or type of occupation.

Enterprises’ biased views: Because of the enterprises’ biased views, regional college graduates or second campus graduates cannot get a job easily.

A recruit department worker at a college located in Seoul said, ``Although their GPA or TOEIC scores are high, employers asked to exclude female students or graduates of second campus.`` ``Because the school also wants as many as possible job-seekers, we can’t ignore companies’ demands.`` he added.

Se-In Oh, the editor of Recruit, an employment information magazine, said, ``As the number of company that uses the internet for recruiting increase, it is common to see thousands of applicants compete for just one position. So companies use applicants’ alma maters as an entry-level standard to select applicants. And the number of cases in which graduates from regional colleges or second campuses are treated unequally.``

Some college graduates who thinks that the reason why they could not get a job was that they did not graduate from prestigious colleges, turn their direction to government employment in which their education backgrounds are not factors.

Kim (28) who graduated a regional public college said, ``Even if I pass the process of document evaluation and have interviews, the final results are failures every time. I think the reason is because I am from a regional college.`` With a bitter smile, he said that he will prepare for public employment exams.

Hyun Ki-Deuk ratio@donga.com