By Keith Rivas |Contributing Writer|
The number of difficulties which college students must go through over the course of their time in higher education isn’t slowing down. Depression, desperation, and a desire for acceptance lie at the core of what college tends to allow for.
Because of these side effects, some students may be less likely to pursue opportunities in their desired field of work for the sole reason that they do not feel like they’ll be accepted.
It is a foolish thing to believe, but it is hard to argue with students who feel like they’ve looked in the mirror already.
Battling that assertion, Hollywood director and actor Zack Ward took to Twitter to respond to a statement on student involvement.
“Getting them involved and keeping them motivated to stay involved is the key,” Ward tweeted.
When thinking of how to accomplish just that, the avenues available aren’t as numerous as the consequences of not reaching out. Taking that first step to reach out, being outside of the box during interviews or internships, and remembering their name can go such a long way.
But that is only half of the battle. Knowing that the next step is understanding where to fight for the attention of college students.
That answer is social media.
Millennials have this intimate connection with their cell phone, among other electronic devices, that hasn’t been seen in previous generations. While absolutely a generational thing, the problem that often occurs is attempting to find the right way to incorporate social media into the workplace.
An assumption between generations is that social media zaps the desire to work hard from somebody — for lack of better phrasing, it makes them lazy. The thought there is also that is disconnects users from the real world, giving them a false sense of reality.
This is the quickest way to take motivation out of the conversation.
Blogger Evan Lovett echoed Zack Ward’s comment by also putting emphasis on motivation and initiative.
“Absolutely true, need the complete buy-in but more importantly the initiative to do so,” tweeted Lovett.
With that being said, the questions remains whether or not college students want to show their initiative to older generations if there’s no allowance for understanding in the workplace. When that doesn’t happen, frustration is sure to follow and it speaks for itself in the field.
While former LA Kings All-Star Bernie Nicholls wrote that he “couldn’t agree more,” professional blogger Corbin Warnock didn’t tweet to the same tune.
“It depends… there is always two sides to every story,” remarked Warnock.
The idea of a central college struggle isn’t the right way to approach the topic. Every student goes through tremendously different things and it’s not fair to them if they’re painted with a broad brush.
Also, since initiative is everything, that needs to be the focus for post-graduation students looking for a job or current students trying to land the internship of their dreams.
Where there’s miscommunication, there’s lack of efficiency and workflow—that’s hard for millennials to go through after getting through college hoping that a job would be on the other side of the ceremony handshake.
A job at that point isn’t a guarantee, but the initiative that gets students to that next level is always there. The problem, though, will always be that initiative is optional.
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