NeighborScapes

Chris Furuya, NeighborScapes: Work Force Development’s Program Coordinator and NeighborScapes: Social Good’s Grant Writer and Program Coordinator will be giving a lecture at the University of Chicago on Sunday, Feb. 20, on “Job Creation: How To Get Paid to Do What You Love”. Abstract follows.

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The school year is just past half over, and most consulting firms have already hired. Grad schools won’t get back to you until April, or as late as May. And, if you are a fourth year and don’t have your next steps lined up yet, you’re probably sweating.

The scary truth is that work as we know it has changed dramatically since the economy bottomed out. Only 24.4 percent of 2010 college graduates who applied for a job had one waiting for them after graduation (up from 19.7 percent in 2009). The average job search takes 8-10 months of full time, dedicated effort, and experienced professionals are going 2+ years without work, using social services to be placed in entry level and menial jobs to pay their bills, or dropping out of the work force altogether from fatigue. The decks are stacked against recent college grads, and even more, as levels of education decline.

Even the college grads that do find traditional work, are finding much more brainless work at salaries far below their pre-2008 levels (and generally starting at ¾ of the rate of an entry level truck driver). This is particularly powerful in its long-term effects. A recent New York Times article reports that “when jobs are scarce, more college grads start out in lower-level jobs with lower starting salaries. Academic research suggests that for many of these graduates, that correlates to overall lower levels of career attainment and lower lifetime earnings…The pat answer is that college students should consider graduate school as a way to delay a job search until things turn around, and that more high school students should go to college to improve their prospects… For many undergraduates, especially those with large student debts, graduate school would be prohibitively expensive. And while more than half of this year’s high school grads are expected to be enrolled in college in the fall, most will have to work to help pay the bills. For them, college is not a retreat from a bad job market; a bad market is an obstacle to a college degree.”

In summary, there’s barely any work, the jobs that are available pay poorly and offer little room for growth, and education buys progressively little as time goes on.

However, the flipside of this is that the ground is fertile for a new wave of entrepreneurship and small business creation. Established organizations are closing, creating room in the market for new organizations, and while the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act is running out, it has inspired a new wave of job creation opportunities for those savvy enough to turn a stone into soup. Chris Furuya of NeighborScapes: Workforce Development and NeighborScapes: Social Good walks you through creating a job you’ll love doing, while making a living as you do it and identifying clients that are delighted to pay you.

Chris Furuya is a University of Chicago alumna, class of 2009, and previously of Snell House. She has completed an AmeriCorps VISTA/LeaderCorps year through the United Way and Aunt Martha’s Youth Services and Aunt Martha’s Health Care Network as a community advocate and program assistant with heavy grant writing and young adult/employment experience. Her work through NeighborScapes’ workforce development program has placed hard-to-employ young adults in jobs specifically tailored to their interests and skills, offering a living wage and career development opportunities, and mobilized high skill workers to volunteer their way into full-time employment. Meanwhile, her work as program affiliate and primary grant drafter at Metro Alliance Consulting/NeighborScapes: Social Good has brought poverty-alleviation, community development programs to under-served Chicago south side and southland communities. Chris is currently a Research and Development Associate at the Chicago Lawyers’ Committee for Civil Rights and an Associate Consultant at LM Strategies. Chris continues to work with NeighborScapes on a project-specific, interest-driven basis. Chris has previously published articles on job creation and career development in Ms. Career Girl, Monster and Excelle.