DAVAO CITY, 21 April — Unemployment is just like a plague hitting even booming cities in the country. “After four years in college, where do I go?” is a question fresh university graduates ask of themselves.
Sad to say, not many of them get the answer.
In this city considered as a fast-developing and favorite investment place, employment has been shrinking from 9.3 percent in 1994 and 6.4 in 1997.
Jobs are hard to come by.
The Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) said the government has been doing its best to help, offering training programs for those who lack qualifications for available jobs.
Ofelia Domingo, regional chief of DOLE said,” We can help those who don’t have enough qualifications to land them a decent job. In fact we have been conducting seminars for job-seekers for them to be able to cope with and qualify the interviews.”
Causes of unemployment among graduates are said to be traced to the mismatch between the courses some students take and their true interests. “We have incompetent graduates,” according to a large employer when asked for comment.
Studies have it that graduates of the University of the Philippines succeed because they are more practical and down to earth.
The fact they studied in one of the best school in the Philippines, its graduates are known to enroll themselves in short courses to add to to their acquired knowledge.
They develop more by enrolling in speech and personality development clinics after graduation while technical students study in vocational schools to learn the actual craft.
Confidence is what is lacking among graduates of non-popular schools, observers say.
The don’t want to work other than what they finished for a starter and lock themselves in what they believe suit them, they added.
In the case of Iza, a senior education student, she says she hates her course.
“I’m studying a course I don’t like. Honestly, I only take it because I’ve no other choice,” she revealed.
Sociologists also blame parents who dream for their children instead of asking them what they want when they grow up.
Parents try to choose a named school for their own pride and fail to consider that a student can excel in specialized schools, they added.
