Graduates Face Many Barriers in Job Hunting E["t Ccg
It is graduation time again. Whether joining the social workforce or pursuing O> ^~SO
advanced studies, about four million Chinese graduates will soon turn a new page in mW(_FS2%,
their lives. Still, no matter what, campus life will remain deeply etched on the minds P(i2bbU
of China's former students. What lies ahead for the country's graduates? xW;[}t-QS
Statistics released by relevant departments of China show that in 2006, graduates C05{,w?
from all Chinese colleges and universities numbered 4.13 million, up 750,000 from .q[sk
2005 with a growth rate of roughly 22%. Hence, the employment tension further }(%}"%$
intensifies. Meanwhile, various intangible barriers exist in social relations, regional y!c7y]9__2
restriction, permanent residency and university's reputation have made the graduates' j%y+W{
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job-hunting process tougher. adr^6n6v
Some analyze that against the backdrop of intensified employment tension for h)RM9813<
university graduates, needy students from rural and urban areas usually find
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themselves in relatively inferior positions. Y'H/
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Some graduates realize that in order to get a job, they have to sign some "unfair FT
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treaties" that promise not to take the postgraduate exam or leave the company within kJpHhAn4
several years, or they have to pay 5,000 Yuan for breaching the contract. Some Nv]/L+i
recruiters even declare openly that they only need students from famous universities, g
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so graduates from other schools are not even entitled to apply. > 5:e1a?9
Currently the contradiction in China's higher education has transferred from entering x(N}^Hu
to leaving a university and from the difficulty in enrollment to employment after P2RL\`<"
graduation. It has become a common phenomenon that "graduates become jobless". ddhTr
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Should this problem not be tackled rightly, the employment issue would turn into a v")
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new factor that causes social instability. $K
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College—A New Experience 0nnq/u^
Living at college, first of all, gives me a sense of responsibility, of being on my J0bs$
own. My parents aren’t around to say, ―No, you’re not going out tonight‖ or ―Did you 3?CpylCO
finish your homework?‖ Everything I do has to be my decision, and that gives me the ]h$TgX
responsibility of handling my own life. During the second week I was at college, I had w.-i !Ls
to go out and look for a bank where I could open an account. Before that I looked in %d\+(:uu/
the phone book since I had no clue about any banks around here or where they were )`7h,w
J[1
located. I went to the bank and made decisions for myself—whether to have a :e
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checking or savings account and whether or not to get a MASTER card. Vo8"/]_h
Friendly people: that’s another aspect I like about college. On my first day (and YL0RQa
even now) people were nice to me. I came to Marymount University here in Virginia lB@K;E@r8
from New York and – even though I’d been here before—I was a bit confused about ?V&a |:N9
where I was going. My mother and I drove in, not knowing the building we were +q%goG8
supposed to go to, and the guard was especially nice: with a smile, he told us what <N&