It is assumed attending college means you want the best possible education to help you attain the perfect job, but these days, the competition grows and grows. Without pushing ourselves to be the best, we just might end up at the bottom of the food chain.
No longer can you simply think, "I would like to be a lawyer," go to law school and pass the bar exam. Now, you have to graduate top in your class just to be considered for law school. As college students, have we completely exhausted ourselves by trying to be the best? For many of us, if we think in terms of Darwin's "survival of the fittest," just how far will we go to get what we want? If we are taught to be competitive from an early age, does it ever end?
According to The Week Magazine, more than 2.5 million U.S. schoolchildren have lost their summer vacation, as their school districts have opted for a "balanced schedule." It is estimated 10 percent of public school children will not have a summer vacation by 2012. The so-called American tradition of summer vacation is beginning to dissipate.
Now, as schoolchildren are losing their anticipated summer vacations, you think, "Do college students even have a summer vacation?"
Typically after your sophomore year, the job hunt or pursuit of an internship already begins. Anything that can be a résumé-builder is what becomes the priority for a college student's summer.
In 2008, the National Association of Colleges and Employers found 50 percent of graduating students had held internships, an increase from the 17 percent shown in a 1992 study by Northwestern University. This statistic has climbed even more since then. This means hundreds of thousands of students hold internships each year. Still, some experts estimate one-fourth to one-half of these internships are unpaid.
Regardless of pay or not, employers want and need that internship stamp on a résumé. In today's economy especially, internships are ideal for the employer and the student. It's the quid pro quo mentality that the employer gets the free labor and the student gets the recommendation. But do you need a certain number of internships to go the distance?
There is no limit. Ask any professor or career services manager, and they will most likely tell you more is always better. Right now, I'm applying for my third internship and I'm applying for more than ever before. It feels like college applications all over again with the same stressors added to the process.
There are hundreds of websites you can find that tell you how or where to apply for an internship or part-time job for the summer. If you don't search on your own, I'm sure e-mails are sent to you regularly about a new job experience from either the Miami University administration, organizations on campus, professors, et cetera. It's that daily reminder in your head saying, "Here is your chance. Seize the opportunity before someone else does."
As Darwin once said, "In the long history of humankind (and animal kind, too), those who learned to collaborate and improvise most effectively have prevailed." It was clear to Darwin that competition will never end because it has always been present in human nature. We will always strive to be better than our colleague, partner or friend.
As college students, we understand the saying, "While most are dreaming of success, winners wake up and work hard to achieve it."
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Let's hope in these four years, that wake up call happens sooner rather than later.
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