Electrical Engineering Directory

Hundreds of thousands of students will walk across stages this spring and accept handshakes and their diplomas from college presidents. Then, most will step into the worst job market since their great-grandparents entered the workplace.

Corporate representatives, who used to visit campuses in large numbers for job fairs and recruitment pitches, have cut back in the last few months, career development staffers at Inland Southern California’s colleges say. A group that monitors the recruitment of college seniors nationally predicts hiring will be flat this year.

That might be encouraging news because thousands of college seniors’ parents and older siblings are facing layoffs or uncertain job situations right now.

Inland students who recently graduated or plan to this spring say they’re going to hunker down and give it their best effort.

“It’s a tough market to even get an interview,” said Justin Kirojan, who graduated from UCR last spring with an engineering degree. “It’s easy for employers to filter people out.”

Kirojan’s degree might give him an advantage. According to a study by the National Association of Colleges and Employers, mechanical and electrical engineering are two of the fields where new workers are in demand and command some of the best starting salaries.

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Greg Vojtko / The Press-Enterprise

Students Ratchawee Sungwornrajsubh, left, and Pratumporn Ricca attend a presentation by Enterprise Rent-A-Car at Cal State San Bernardino.

Accounting and computer-related industries also offer some good opportunities.

Stephen Mendoza, a 2008 management graduate at Cal State San Bernardino, said what’s tough is that his college years were busy. The months of inactivity while looking for that first job have been challenging.

It’s also been a learning experience. Mendoza said he had been in contact with a company that looked like a promising lead. Before too long, he figured out that the life insurance company he was talking to was less a job opportunity than it was a scam.

“I just try to stay positive and keep going forward. It’s all I can do,” Mendoza said. “I know I am coming in at a transitional time.”

Mendoza, Kirojan and several other students listened to a recruitment pitch Thursday at Cal State San Bernardino’s career services office from Lionel Clayton, an area manager for Enterprise Rent-a-Car. The company has several dozen Inland locations and is one of the few businesses considered recession-proof. It also is usually listed as one of the best places to start a career.

Clayton said he judges management employees not on how they do on their great days but on how they cope with the bad ones.

“How did you overcome it when you hit the wall” Clayton asked the group. “How did you scale it?”

Fighting for a Job

Josh Lopez, who will graduate this year with a management degree, said he expects to learn about adversity. He said he’ll be looking for a company such as Enterprise, with good training programs and opportunities. .

“I’m a bit discouraged, because I know it will be tough,” Lopez said. “But I have to survive. I have to fight. I know it’s a competitive world out there.

A recent study by NACE indicates that hiring for the class of 2009 will be about the same as last year, and starting salaries will be flat as well. Andrea Koncz, employment information manager for the Bethlehem, Pa.-based nonprofit, said there are indications that the next survey will show more weakness.

Ten years ago, before the dot-com bubble popped, graduates with high-tech skills were going straight to jobs with $80,000 annual salaries. As recently as 2004, the job market for grads was growing at a rate of about 8 percent each year.

Koncz said the reason the current survey is not showing a decline is that many firms believe a person recruited now will have enough experience to become a valuable employee once this economic cycle ends. Also, some areas, especially government, may be losing a significant number of people to retirement.

Seeking Students

Pamela Abell, employee relations counselor at CSUSB, said Enterprise is still a regular campus recruiter, and Target has a visit scheduled.

“But some employers keep coming on campus just to keep the relationship going,” Abell said.

Randy Williams, director of the career center at UCR, said attendance by recruiters at job fairs is off about 40 percent this year. It’s a slide that started last fall, when the economic slowdown became more pronounced, he said.

The attitude of students seems to be changing as well, Williams said. In the past, most requests for help seemed to be for support areas, such as résumé assistance. Now, students want down-and-dirty job leads.

“There’s a sense they have to get out there and hustle,” Williams said.