Post university stress; how to find a job in the current job market? by Charlotte Teyler

Post university blues have struck; reality has kicked in and I have realised that the familiar comforting structure and sense of purpose provided by university life will soon be gone. This thought tends to creep up on me out of nowhere. One morning I awoke to find myself reflecting on my life and what the next step will be after I graduate from university. What comes now? What are my options? How will I get there? And the biggest question of all what do I want to do with my life? The stress factor grows as I realise that after 5 years of higher education and considerable student debt, there are a distinct lack of jobs on the market. Oh dear, it cannot be that bad, or is it? As I started browsing through the newspapers and job portals on the internet for something that seems interesting I realise that I need a degree just to understand what lies behind some of the job titles I come across. While browsing for jobs, television and media provide the latest updates regarding protests around the globe, focusing on how difficult it is to enter the job market. I get the feeling that we are all placed within two categories within society; winners or losers, and the gap between the two is getting bigger and deeper everyday.In some countries the situation is worse than in others, like Spain which has as much as 44% long term unemployment amongst its youth. The young seems to be the group that has become the victim of this financial crisis, as the older generation desperately hold on to their jobs and refuse to retire. They are no longer fooled by the early retirement packages offered by private and state run companies, which in previous downturns used to take advantage of. The difference between long term unemployment among the younger and older workforce in 2011 is 19.7 % against 7.3 %, which totals a 3.1 % increase from 2007 according to Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). That might not sound so bad until we find that there are about 1.3 billion people participating in todays workforce and that the job market has decreased by 205 million jobs. With statistics like this, the future can feel very depressing, but do not despair the elderly population will retire (eventually). Meanwhile I can always get a second degree (If I can afford it). Apparently, there is a high demand for cashiers and waitresses out there.

Last year I wrote about the very first stage in the application process namely knowing well what you want to do and choosing the appropriate PG studies. You should read that post first as this step is absolutely crucial. The very first thing you need to do is to define the PG studies you want to do and identify the universities you want to apply to. As said in the above cited post, university rankings are more or less useless to you as long as you have not chosen clearly what you want to do. Once you did that you will be able to write a good application.

This year I will explain a little the application procedure from the other side of the barrier. This is mainly to make you avoid two major mistakes Chinese students, particularly, tend to make: first, throwing a lot of money at agencies, and second, freaking out unnecessarily for something that is, in fact, rather simple and straightforward. I’m writing this post too, I have to admit, to make life easier for us, your lecturers, by guiding you to what kind of information you will have to give to us for your reference letters and what you can expect from us.

So, how does the application process work? Applications are, first of all, open until the deadline. It is very, very rare that you will get a place simply because you were the first to apply or that you will be refused a place because you were the last to apply. If the university’s admission office says that the application deadline is in March or June then it is in March or June and your application will be dealt with in the same manner whether it comes in November, January or March. So, there is no need to panic already now.

There is also no point of applying to 15 or 20 universities. You can study only at one so you should apply also only for a small number of those where you really want to study at. If you chose well your post-graduate degree and your university, and if you prepare well your application bearing in mind what I am saying below about the application procedures, it is entirely sufficient to apply for three, maybe four universities.

Second, the first set of criteria upon which a candidate is offered a place or not are hard criteria such as marks and the specific requirement set out in the program description. If the application criteria says for instance that this PG degree requires a First class degree (for UK post-graduate studies), an IELTS score of 7.5 or a GRE of any kind (for US studies) then you will not have much chances applying with a 2:2, an IELTS score of 5.5 or without GRE. The same is true if you apply for studies which are somewhat removed from what you have done before and the program specification says that you should have an UG degree in this or a “related” discipline. For IS students, this means that you will have little chances getting a place in an Engineering program or in Computer Science.

Except if…you can show in your CV and your personal statement that what you have done so far is indeed related to the post-graduate degree you are aiming at, and if this claim is convincingly supported by evidence. There are indeed many grey zones and borderline cases where the second set of criteria, namely the quality of your CV, your personal statement and your reference letters will play a role. It might be that you have been throughout your studies interested in using computer models and programming (for instance for simulating diplomatic negotiations), that you have written your own little simulation program and that there is somewhere out there a PG degree in computer simulation and modeling. In this case, you do have chances even if your UG degree was not in sciences but in IS.

Personal statements, CVs and letters of reference then play an important role in demonstrating your particular interests and capacities. Personally, if I have to look at applications – and I do so only if it is not a straightforward case, otherwise the application does not even come to my desk – I only look at the letters of reference and the personal statements if the hard criteria do not give me a clear enough picture of the candidate. However, I immediately stop reading if I see the first lines of such standard PS or references that begin with sentences like “Since I was 3 years old it was my dream to…” or “This is an outstanding student…blablabla” (when the student’s marks are somewhere in the low 50s this is a particularly silly thing to read). This kind of PS and reference letters are useless as they do not tell anything about what the candidate really wants and is able to do.

Good personal statements demonstrate the real interests of a student and show that he or she has not been only dreaming of becoming a computer scientist (even though she/he studied IS) but that the student has done things. Everybody can say that it was always her/his dream to become a firefighter, actor, journalist, engine driver etc. but it is, of course, only credible if that person has done something in that sense. So a good PS will not say “it was always my dream to be a journalist” but rather “When I was in High School I was editor and reporter for our school journal. In this time, we edited four issues of our journal per year. One special issue for which I was entirely in charge dealt with the history of the Soviet Union and for this I was able to interview the eminent historian XYZ. … I was also involved in the creation and editing of a students’ journal called XXX. This journal ….”. Personal statements which say what you have done (and not what you have been dreaming of doing) and which do so in a detailed and evidenced way can make a difference (that is not to say that they WILL but that they MAY).

Similarly, reference letters that make a difference are those which can say something substantial about this particular student. Letters filled with platitudes and phrases do not do so. In order to have your lecturers write such meaningful reference letters, however, you will need to provide them with something to say. If you have never shown up to your tutorial meetings, if you have never said a word in seminars, if you have not done anything noticeable up to the point that your lecturer hardly knows your face… in that case there will be nothing much in your reference letter to make you stand out against other candidates. Remember, the letter of reference only plays a role if your case is not straightforward, if you are borderline and if the person in the admissions office is looking for good reasons to offer you a place. If the lecturer does not have anything particular to say about you, then your reference letter will be pretty standard. And a good standard letter is one that fairly and openly comments on your marks, confirming simply what the hard criteria have already told about you. Letters which claim that a student is excellent when her/his marks are not, are non-sense and will hardly be considered.

However, a letter that explains that your marks are in the 50s/60s because you have been so involved as editor and journalist in the university’s student newspaper (or in computer programming, or firefighting, or engine driving or…) and which give detailed and substantial information on your studies, may make a difference and get you pass formal criteria (again: MAY not WILL). But a lecturer can, of course, only write such a letter if you have really done these things.

So, the habit of  “reference shopping”, i.e. of asking dozens of lecturers to write a reference so that the agency can chose at its will what they consider the “best”,  so commonly found on our campus is also rather useless. It is not because a reference says that you are “excellent” that anyone in an admissions office in the UK (or the US or elsewhere) will believe it. It is only if the reference really talks about your achievements and qualities that it is credible. And if you have done really good things in your studies or besides them then this is what will make your application different and sticking out.

Now, this might lead some of you to think that a really full CV with a lot of activities is what you need. Well, unfortunately no. If it is true that those who are really committed to something and who have done a lot of extra-curricular work in this domain, have much better chances to get into post-graduate studies of their liking even if they do not fulfill all hard criteria… then this does not mean simply because you fill up your CV with a lot of activities that this will enhance your chances. What is important is commitment, interest, passion for what you are doing and for the post-graduate studies you are applying for. If you have those, then you not only chose the right studies for you, you can also make a convincing case that you will be a good student in this program even if you do not fulfill all hard criteria. And this is what universities are looking for: students of which they can be more or less sure that they will succeed in this degree. And this brings us back to the starting point: first, above all things, you have to chose well your PG degree.

You might also ask now “Do I really have to be special and stick out?” Well, no, of course you don’t have to. You can also do the simple straightforward thing of choosing a degree that suits your undergraduate studies and 3 or 4 universities which offer this post-graduate program in your range of marks, make sure that you fit the formal criteria (marks and program description) and ask your personal tutor for a reference. Provide the lecturers you ask for a reference with all necessary information (degree, university, address and contact person at the admissions office, your transcripts, your PS and your CV), and that’s it. Remember that we do not give references back to students but only send them directly to the university.

Professor Chapman from Peking University

In his lecture, Professor Chapman focused on  Henry L. Stimson, Secretary of State under President Herbert Hoover, and discussed his influence on American foreign policy towards Japan following the Japanese military action in China known as the Shenyang (Mukden) Incident of 1931.  The Stimson Doctrine, laid down in a note of January 7, 1932, lay the basis for the  US policy of not recognizing Japan’s seizure of Mandchuria on the grounds that these  international territorial changes were executed by force. Professor Chapman detailled in his lecture how Stimson had arrived at his opinion about Japan’s policies and how these had evolved over the year. UNNC  students, who are interested in foreign policy and international history, learned a lot from this lecture which challenged received wisdom in a number of points.

The model United Nations conference at UNNC

The conference was modelled a General Assembly session as well as a meeting of the Economic and Social Council, discussing the topic “Should all African conflicts be handled by African countries themselves, and not by the third parties?” inthe former and “Should genetically modified food be banned?” in the latter. For two days, students discussed both topics with a seriousness and expertise which stood not behind the “real” world.

“This conference was the largest one held by our association,” said Fang Chenlin, the president of UNNC Model United Nations Association. “Compared with last three times, we had a better preparation this time and it was the first time that we arranged a campus tour and a city tour during the Conference. This way, the delegates from other universities gained a better understanding of our campus and Ningbo and we made a lot of friends. If all things go well, we expect to hold the Pan-China Conference every year and invite more universities to come.”

For our students, there are numerous opportunities to attend similar conferences. In the past 4 years, the UNNC MUNA has sent students to Peking University, Zhejiang University, Shanghai Foreign Language University, Hong Kong, and Taipei to participate in MUN conferences. Seven exchange students will attend the Model United Nations Conference held in Nottingham UK intwo weeks.

The speakers: Dr. Catherine Goetze (host, left above), Dr. May Tan Mullins (left below), Dr. Robert Lambert (centre), Dr. Peter Lyth (below), Dr. Mathew Humphrey (right)

Overcoming his jet-lag with passionate effervescence, Dr. Robert Lambert from the School of History kicked off the event with an overview over the way the Anglo-American world has developed and exercised environmental thoughts. He unveiled the bicentennial tension and struggle between anthropocentric and ecocentric ideas towards the environment (the former as sustainability/scientific management and the latter as preservationism/radical environmentalism). Those Ningbo students who had experienced his impressive enthusiasm at UoN last year were delightfully thrown back in time by his skilful presentation of “use vs. delight of nature”.

Dr. Peter Lyth, an economic historian from the Nottingham Business School highlighted the development of modern transportation and its impact on shaping modern tourism and human needs for mobility. Dr. Lyth challenged the audience’s received ideas about private car ownership with his argument that in the age of traffic jams and stressfully sickening airt ravel, cars and planes are not about leisure but simply about social status. He pointed out that this offered an opportunity for developing sustainable means of transport as technological innovations may well make trains, urban transit systems and even the bicycle more popular. High speed trains as developed in France, Japan and now China, and smart city transport make the passenger’s experience much more pleasant and, at the same time, have less negative impacts on the environment.

After lunch, Dr. May Tan-Mullins gave the audience no time to fall into digestive sleepiness when she jumped right into discussing the state of environmental governance in contemporary China. Taking the toxic leakage accident in Fujian Province last month as starting point, Dr. Tan-Mullins’s presentation took on the dilemma with which Chinese governments are faced between the two ‘E’s, i.e. economy and environment. In her analysis, the key problem of Chinese environmental governance was the conflict between the central and local governments where even well-meant national policies do not correspond well to local needs. She suggested that more active involvement of international actors is a promising way ahead to improve China’s environmental governance as the international leverage allows designing localised programs such as the Cixi Wetlands Project near Ningbo which was sponsored by the World Bank.

Dr. Matthew Humphrey’s presentation tested the audience’s philosophical capacities as he exposed his explanations of the so-called “American paradox” (but which is not restricted to the US) where polls have shown that people declare to be willing to act against climate change in general but unwilling to take concrete sacrifices such as paying more taxes or replacing their cars with public transport. With the theorems of “rational irrationality” and “rational ignorance” he explained that there were good reasons for people to hold such contradicting views. His brainy, yet detailed and precise anatomy of the social psychology of environmental awareness and action revealed the difficulty of getting the general public to agree to concrete measures of environmental protection.

Following the presentations the speakers gathered at the front of the auditorium to talk with the audience. The discussion was mostly centred on Dr. Lambert’s question to the attending students: how could China’s religious and cultural values help China realise sustainability? The students evoked their learning and experience of China’s traditional value on the harmony between nature and the man, but also expressed pessimism given other overriding concerns such as everyday stress from work and life.

The symposium ended without a concrete conclusion, but it was certainly an enriching experience of thinking and learning. For many participants some of the insights that came during the day were new and enlightening. Issues that are rarely discussed in the Chinese public discourse were brought to the forefront. In contrast to the speakers’ rich account of western environmental history and thoughts, China’s history lies largely to be filled with the young generation’s efforts. A lesson worthwhile to be spread to wider audience. Let’s hope amongst the students present at the symposium would arise China’s John Muir, founder of the Sierra Club, Aldo Leopold, one of the “founding fathers” of the Green movement, or perhaps even a Teddy Roosevelt, the 19^th century American president to whom we owe most of the US natural reservations.

Well, first the exam scripts are brought back to the Faculty Office where they are counted and checked. Then they are sent to the module convenor who will start marking them right away as turnover times at UNNC are less than a week even for very big classes. Every division has its marking criteria defined in its Student Handbook or, in the case of the Division IS, in the Essay Writing Guide.  Although formulated slightly differently, marking criteria across the divisions take into consideration three features of the exam: the sophistication and clearness of the argument, the written presentation and the knowledge base demonstrated in the exam answers. In order to make sure that marking is fair, exam scripts are marked anonymously and moderated where necessary. “Moderation” is how we call the process by which scripts are second marked and checked upon by the external examiner. The marking procedure at the Division IS complies with all criteria set out in the Quality Manual of the University of Nottingham on assessments: http://www.nottingham.ac.uk/quality-manual/assessment/index.htm

In the entire process the roles of the exams officer and of the external examiner are crucial. The exams officer actually organizes the entire process of examination in the division. She, in this case Dr. Rosaria Franco, manages the setting of exam questions and supervises the marking process, assembles the marks and prepares the internal exam board. The external examiner is a senior academic colleague appointed from a third university (in our case the UG EE is from the University of Liverpool and the PG EE from the University Hamburg).  Before the exams ,he/she checks the question to see whether they are consistent with what was taught in the module, if they are clearly and unambiguously formulated and if they give all students a fair chance to succeed in the exam. She/he furtheron checks the marks and the marking procedure for all modules. From every module we second mark about 10% of the scripts which are usually the borderline cases (49, 59, 69), all firsts and all fails. Second marking is also anonymous and marks are discussed between the first and second marker. If after the second  marking student marks are still borderline, fail or first, these scripts are sent to the EE together with the essays. The role of the EE is not only to take a final and usually binding decision but also to check if marking was fair and consistent across all modules and within one module. If the borderline, fail and first scripts do not represent 10% of the class, the exam officers sends more sample scripts to the EE, usually by picking some from the range of the 40, of the 50s and 60s. The EE compares with the module handbook and the class readings and material, and then comments on the marks, the exams and our comments to essays and exams. The marks confirmed and signed off by the EE are final. Marks cannot be appealed and this for the good reason that the anonymity of the marking, the second marking and external marking procedure are seen as sufficient safeguards against arbitrariness or unfairness.

Module convenors, too, pay extreme attention to their marking in order to remain fair and just in their judgments. Experience teaches them to look a second time at scripts they have given extraordinary low or extraordinary high marks, and they will, besides the formal second marking procedures, seek advice with colleagues, the exam officer or the Head of Division in cases of doubt. Lecturers in our division also devote much time to writing essay and exam feedback in order to show students ways to improve their performance. The advice for essay writing, exam preparation and dissertation writing we give you in the study skills series (available in the Faculty Office) results from this experience. The aim of our marking is to help students improve their study experience and to show us their best.

Global Governance graduate Du Ran with the Head of Division International Studies,wearing the UNNC MA gown: black gown, Edinburgh style black hood with light blue and carlett lining.

Saturday saw the first graduation ceremony for our MA Global Governance students. In black gowns with black hoods which are lined in light blue students received the congratulations of the President of UNNC, Professor Yang Fujiya and the Provost, Professor Roger Woods, as well as of their Head of Division, Dr. Catherine Goetze.
For some the professoral procession into the hall at the sound of Georg Friedrich Haendel’s Water Music seems like a peculiar form of carnival, for others it constitutes one of the most solemn moments of their lives. But where does this tradition of procession, congregation, and gowns come from?

Dr. May Tan-Mullins from the Division International Studies, wearing the UNNC PhD gown: carlett gown with light blue lining, Edinburgh style carlett hood with light blue and white lining.

When the first universities were founded in Europe in the Middle Ages (Bologna 1088, Oxford around 1170, Paris around 1200, Salamanca in 1218, Heidelberg in 1386, St. Andrews in 1413 – just to name a few), European societies were divided in internally and externally hierarchically structured professional corporations and guilds. Corporations and guilds were what the modern sociologist Marcel Mauss would call “total” institutions as they defined the lives of their members in all aspects, not only with respect to their profession but also with respect to their marriage and children, their norms and behavior, and even their clothing. Vestimentary codes were omnipresent. Each guild had its own dress and within each guild dresses were distinguished according to the status of the bearer. Additional signs would furthermore indicate local origins, marital status, relationship to the King or religious confession. The dress code would include also the insignia of the craft which were heralded on buildings, furniture or, evidently, on the dresses themselves. These insignia would be tools such as square and compass for carpenters which later on became famously associated with freemasonry, or the hammer for blacksmiths; there would also be in Germany for instance the Brezel for bakers. Furthermore, the feudal division of society defined each professional group with respect to their distance to the King and to God (or the Pope and Bishop as God’s representation), hence, the guilds and corporations defined each individual’s place in the overall society. Dress codes were important to clearly designate the belonging of an individual to his community and to its social status.
Universities were guilds just like any other. In the words of the French medieval historian Jacques Le Goff, the founding of universities represented the professionalization of thinking and teaching. Universities were guilds of teachers and corporations of students. Graduation ceremonies were the ritual admission of new members to the guild itself and to the different statuses within the guild. As all others, universities too were subdivided in three layers of apprenticeship, companions and masters. In the Middle Ages masters, companions and apprentices were not only bound to each other by a relationship of seniority but also of personalized obligation. Masters did not only decide what apprentices and companions would learn but also when and who they would marry, where and when they would settle, how much they would earn and be allowed to keep, what roles they were to take over in the community, and also, importantly, who would to be punished for ill behavior and how. The worst punishment, even worse than any harsh physical punishment, would be the exclusion from the guild which withdrew protection from the individual and made him an outlaw. These individuals would often be physically marked as outlaws, through branding or tattoos for instance or, like in the case of German carpenters, through ripping off the earring they would have been conferred in their companion graduation ceremony. In German “Schlitzohr” (slit ear) is still a common word for swindler and rascal.
Of all this, our current graduation ceremonies are only distant memories. We do not live in a feudal society anymore, dress codes are now dictated by H&M and Prada and not our relationship to the King and to God, and failure to obey the rules of the profession do not result in being outlawed anymore, even though deontological codes are still very important (note that for instance proven cases of plagiarism may result in exclusion from university and that other universities will refuse registering students who have been excluded on the grounds of plagiarism). Yet, even more interestingly, academic graduation ceremonies have survived in those societies who either never had the tradition of guilds like the US-American society or who have very early in modern history destroyed guilds and corporations like the British society. In Germany and France where guilds and corporations were only abolished in the past 100 respectively 200 years and where universities are still clearly marked by the hierarchies of professors, doctors and students, there are no official graduation ceremonies like that we witnessed last Saturday.

1968 student revolt in Germany

In fact, the universities of Paris and Heidelberg were, in 1968, even the starting point of the radical student movement which led not only to a profound rethinking of the role of knowledge and teaching in universities but also to the abolishment of gown processions. “Unter den Talaren, der Muff von 1000 Jahren” (The gowns of a 1000 year’s pong) was the battle cry of the student revolt.
What has remained hence is not so much the hierarchical idea of graduation, the initiation of an individual into its specific place in a given hierarchy within a guild, but rather the more general and egalitarian idea of admitting a new member to the community. Contemporary graduation ceremonies are more about honoring the achievements of the students and celebrating their result than about fitting an individual into a hierarchy and set of rules. The solemn feeling comes from the satisfaction over successful studies and not from the grace accorded to the student by the corporation. It is a students’ celebration now. And so all staff of the Division International Studies congratulates all UNNC MA graduates!!!