{ title: 'The Paper sun. (Utica, N.Y.) 1974-19??, February 08, 1977, Page 7, Image 7', download_links: [ { link: 'http://www.loc.gov/rss/ndnp/ndnp.xml', label: 'application/rss+xml', meta: 'News about NYS Historic Newspapers - RSS Feed', }, { link: '/lccn/np00230002/1977-02-08/ed-1/seq-7/png/', label: 'image/png', meta: '', }, { link: '/lccn/np00230002/1977-02-08/ed-1/seq-7.pdf', label: 'application/pdf', meta: '', }, { link: '/lccn/np00230002/1977-02-08/ed-1/seq-7/ocr.xml', label: 'application/xml', meta: '', }, { link: '/lccn/np00230002/1977-02-08/ed-1/seq-7/ocr.txt', label: 'text/plain', meta: '', }, ] }
Image provided by: SUNY Polytechnic Institute
Tuesday, February 8, 1977 PAPERSUN Last Semester Blues! By Jim Allen The fall ’76 semester has just gone by in a rush, and the Spring ’77 semester is upon us. Being one of the many seniors at this school this one will probably be my last. No, I’m not going to commit suicide but I do have to find a job, which is almost as bad. After 16 years of school, I’m about to wrap my education up, and become a working man. Thè trouble here is that while I’m graduating with a 4 year degree in business, I still have no skills or special knowledge to get me ahead. The only skill I have, after all these years of school, is how to take tests and pass them, and sometimes I’m not even good at that. The main difference between me graduating high school and me graduating college is that I’m four years older. Maybe a few brain cells got charged up or expanded, but the average Joe off the street who is my age probably has done more and gotten himself farther ahead in that four years than is now possible today. The job market and career potential was certainly stronger in 1972-73 than it is now in 1976-77. It seems just like the other day I was enrolling in Orange County Community College, and now here I am, soon to get a B.S.er degree at a reconverted knitting mill turned college. I almost wish I could be a junior again but the fascination of what lies ahead or what doesn’t lie ahead keeps me going. At the moment, juniors have very little weight on their shoulders. I look around and I can see them acting goofy, knowing full well that they still have the excuse that they’ll be back next semester, while seniors are working on their resumes and getting serious. What does the future hold for Upper Division graduates? I really don’t know, but I have an inkling, and I suggest we all better put our resumes in at the Riverside Mall in April, after all, we don’t want to compete with the high school crowd in May. A lot of Upper Division graduates work there, and you know what they say, if you got the right connections, you’ll get the job. One professor here said in class quite candidly about the possibility of being hired by a well known firm in Texas, “Unless you have a godfather on the inside, your chances of being hired with a B.P.S. degree from here are about nil.\ Irregardless, even if you weren’t thinking of that, don’t bother to apply for the job of busboy at a fancy restaurant in Albany. Our last year’s class president (who will remain anonymous in this article) already has that job. If you are in business and you feel that you are lucky, apply for Assistant Manager at McDonald’s, or if you want to have it your way, at Burger King. There's always one opening up. Right not, you’re probably thinking “Boy, that Jim Allen sure has some sense of humor,” and I’m thinking “Boy, I sure wish I did.” What really convinced me that finding a decent paying job (with or without dignity) was over the Christmas vacation in my old home town of bleak, bleary, blighted, ugly Newburgh. They had an ad in the local paper that read similar to this: “Help Wanted in Soon to Open Truckers T~li iWtWr-- 40 Positions Available from Dishwasher to Manager - Apply at the Ramada Inn this MWF at 9 to 2 p.m.” So you would figure they would have a moderate turnout because times are “getting better.” 500 PEOPLE SHOWED UP THE FIRST DAY! There was a traffic jam outside the Inn, and many people, after long hours of waiting, had to be rescheduled. A young man with a B.S.er degree in Business was interviewed by the local paper and he said, “I hope I get a job here, any job, I really do, because I’ve got to work, and I've got to eat.” I know one girl in the area that has a master’s degree in anthropology. For the last three years she has been working as a cashier at Lloyds, a grocery and department store. As the fruitless and unmarried years go by, she has gotten a few gray hairs and a little heavier, but I am happy to announce she hasn’t gone insane. Now a person who is somewhat of a do gooder would probably say that “If there are no jobs, you can always go on and get your master's degree.” Tv heard that so many times, but what the hell’s the sense of taking another two years of your life, plus another 10 to 15 thousand dollars in opportunity costs, just to get a sheet of paper that declares that you are a Master B.S.er, especially when there are very few jobs available anyway, and the ones that are, the competition is very keen. Besides, with the current grade inflation, and the way B.S. and Master degrees are run off the printing press and the students graduating like a “factory” quota, you have to wonder just how much these degrees are worth. Alright, granted the degree doesn’t entitle you to a job, its main purpose is to make you a forthright knowledgeable, enlighted, and intelligent human being. I admit all those things are nice, but without a decent paying job with a future, I become poor, and when I become poor I become nervous, and when I become nervous I get miserable, and put these three all together, and then I will also get hungry. Case in Point: A friend of mine graduated with a 3.2 cume and received a degree in Medical Lab Technology, enabling him to be qualified in order to be a Medical Lab Technician. (I like degrees that are definite: With Nursing you become a nurse, with Journalism, a Journalist, and with Veternarian Science, a Veternarian. With a degree in business, nothing is definite, it entitles you to endless agonizing possibilities and reminds me of the Robert Frost poem A Read Not Taken. When he graduated, he quit his rinky dink, Mickey Mouse job at a department store (at which I was working at in order to pay my way through college) and started applying to all the hospitals in Newburgh and Middletown. No luck. He then applied to all the hospitals in Orange County. No dice. They just were not hiring at the time, in fact, they were considering laying off a few. He then realized that just because a firm has its name in the paper advertising for jobs, that doesn’t mean that they have jobs available, it may mean that they have a yearly run contract with the paper to keep the firm’s name in the paper, thus procuring hundreds of applicants, and in case one position does not open up, they can look back immediately in their files and take the pick of the crop. Well, so much for the newspaper classified ads, he thought. He started going to the libraries in the area and got ahold as many phone books of cities in New York State as he could. The Yellow Pages comes in handy when looking for hospitals. So now he started applying to numerous hospitals in New York City, as well as a lot of hospitals all around New York State. STILL NO LUCK! He was good in his field, he really dug it, he had good marks, and he was young and intelligent. He had graduated in May and now here it was December (almost Christmas time). He started to get upset. His money supply had been exhausted, his rent was due, his car needed to be repaired, and his parents were starting to lose faith in him. But the crushing blow came when his girl friend left him. I knew he was in love with her, but I didn’t know how much so until I seen him a week after she left. The poor guy was a emaciated zombie, he spoke very listless and very quiet, as if all the life had drained out of him, and he hadn’t eaten anything of substance since that time. Fortunately, this story has a happy ending. After a few weeks within January, a position for Medical Lab Technician was open at a nearby hospital, incredibly enough, the one closest to where he lived. Did he get the job? Well, put it this way, if he didn’t have a friend on the inside who went out of his way convincing his boss to hire Dave, his chances would have been slim indeed. His competition would have been numerous applicants on file with 4.0 cumes. With his $12,500 a year job safely tucked under his belt, Dave’s outlook began to look brighter. He got his car fixed, paid up his back rent, and he started regaining the weight he had lost. And surprise of all surprises, his girl friend came back to him. I wonder if his getting that job had anything to do with it. They were married last June. Right now, Dave and his wife live in a comfortable and very modern 6 room apartment with such niceties as a $1000 stereo system, a beautifully huge aquarium, a new living room set, a super king size bed that is as big as the room I currently sleep in, and a telescope to gaze out at the stars. Being that I am still somewhat of a journeyman pauper with ragweed, I might add that I am also grateful that Dave is now a connoiseur of fine herb. But let me ask you. What was the difference between Dave when he was miserable and felt he had nothing to live for, and the Dave right now, who has a good looking wife and enviable home? Was it that his intelligence increased all of a sudden, or he became a Jesus freak and Jesus showed him the way, or did he just become more of a human being one day. The difference was, if you haven’t already figured it out, is that he got a decent paying and equitable job. THAT WAS THE DIFFERENCE!!! Without a decent paying and equitable job, you are considered washed up, a loser, a has been. No matter how fine a human being you are, or how high your cume is, unless you have a job in which you can feel that you are a man, then you are going to be in sad shape. That’s what the trouble is today. There just are not enough jobs available in which men can feel that they are men, and that their job is suitable enough for them, and that they are not losers. Sure, Dave’s mother and father still bitch at him for not having a $60,000 a year job like his older brother, who is a building contractor, but Dave has tasted the pits and felt the dregs, and he just wants to get nice and healthy right now. The thing that is sometimes pulled when applying for ajob with say, a B.S. or Master’s degree, and you are applying for an entry level position in a firm, is that you are notified that you are over qualified for that job. Then when you apply fpr a high level position, you might be qualified, but “you lack the experience necessary.\ It is hard to get the experience necessary if firms are not going to take the time out and train you. My work experience definitely leaves something to be desired, because so far I am not exactly what you would call “executive material.” My six years on America’s labor force has always been with jobs that hovered around the minimum wage, and with skill involved that could be easily attainable by even the simplest of people. Now, let’s see what goes on my resume. I was a busboy of the Sal Mineo variety at Lloyds Restaurant for a couple of years, where I nearly drove the dishwasher insane by bringing buckets that contained not only dirty dishes, but with fish heads, chicken bones, T-bones, baked potato peels, rolls, ice cubes, salad oil, napkins, lobster claws, and etc. in as well. I was (Continued on page 10) PAGE 7 The Apple Trees On December 16, 17 and 19 the Performing Arts Board presented the musical comedy, The Apple Tree, a triology of three seperate stories, each with its own plot but under a common theme. Part I was entitled, “The Diary of Adam and Eve,” based upon the book by Mark' Twain. It is the bittersweet story of the infamous coup. Jay Jonza, starring as Adam, amde the character more human, rather than the somewhat mythical figure that has been connoted of him in the past. His common-law (?) wife was por trayed by Mary Ann Pratt. Her interpretation of Eve as the sensible, not so dumb blonde was extremely enetertaining. Neil Brinn played the sly snake. Although it was the longest of the three acts, it did not drag at any point, thanks to the splendid performances of all three players. “The Lady or th Tiger,” the second act, was the story of a forbidden affair in the Dark Ages and the crucial decision a Princess must make. All characters were more than adequate-particularly Ms. Kathy Murphy as the bewildered Princess Barbara. I think I might even overlook a grinning Najira as she was being expelled from the room where the brave Captain Sanjar lay seriously wounded. I’ll even forget an off-key baladeer on the final note of the act, “Which one did she choooooooose...” Aside from those minor flaws, it was rather enjoyable-especially King Arik’s (Ralph Canu) magic cigar, an obvious ad-lib. The final act was “Passionella,\ a sort of modern-day Cinderella Carol Mullen, who played the title role as well as her alter-ego, Ella, gan an enthusiastic performance- perhaps a bit too enthusiastic at times. However, she is to be commended her dual role just the same. The character who stole the show, at least in the third act was Flip, the Prince Charming, a sort of rock-star cross between Mick Jagger and Elvis Presley, played to perfection by Rick Diaz, who also directed the entire play with dexterity. In summar, the play was immensely enjoyable, even with the New York skyline collapsing during the final performance. If “best actor” awards are necesary to be mentioned, they would have to go to Jay Jonza as Adam and Kathy Murphy as Princess Bar- bara.As for honorable mention, there is an eleven-way tie, which pertains to the balanceof the Cast of Characters. I encourage the P.A.B. to keep up the good work. Jim Fleming. Vote Yes For Your Student Activity FEE
