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Saturday night fever
By Mindy Hung
Stomach flu, a batch of pot brownies and the '60s drug myth: Why one woman can't seem to take any of it seriously
(01/27/99)

Camille on Campus
By Camille Paglia
Warning! Mentorship land mine ahead!
(01/27/99)

The Big Lie
By Michael O'Donovan-Anderson
Why have today's students become a bunch of grade-grubbing morons?
(01/25/99)

Ditching school
By Eli Lehrer
Why would Marc Weiss, a tenure-track professor at Columbia University, give it all up to coordinate tour bus parking?
(01/22/99)

Justifying J-school
By Orville Schell
The dean of UC-Berkeley's Graduate School of Journalism responds to a recent article critical of institutions like (and including) his
(01/22/99)

BROWSE THE
IVORY TOWER CAREER
ARCHIVE

BY KATY E. SHROUT

Note to those facing a final year of college: Prepare for the unthinkable, for it is about to occur. It happened to me, you know. In one ruthlessly sunny May ceremony on the Quadrangle at Emory University, I ceased being that most beloved American institution, the College Student, and instead was transformed into a new and strangely pathetic creature. Once winked at and given approving pats on the back, now I was astounded to find myself regarded with cool and cynical stares as I answered: "My plans now? Well, I'll probably work for a year and maybe grad school ... oh, no, I'm not sure what kind of grad school yet -- but I am keeping my options open. Maybe I'll go into sociology or playwriting or historic preservation or Chinese or, you know, forestry ... and as for getting a job now -- hey, with my background in existential ethics and Henrik Ibsen's early plays, who wouldn't hire me?" Once lauded for being well-rounded and intellectual, now I was given other labels, foreign and unpleasant. Unprepared. Impractical. Unemployed. It could happen to you.

I know now that when facing a final semester of senior glory, you have little warning that this will happen. This in itself is strange, for as a new college freshman, you were inundated with advice and warnings about what the next four years would bring. You were told to mind your belongings, make new friends, join lots of clubs, beware of strange, unidentified drinks and get enough sleep. For all that this advice was studiously ignored for the most part, at least it was present, giving you some indication that your life was about to change in some important and fundamental way. Unfortunately, equivalent advice does not exist for college seniors -- an inexcusable oversight on someone's part. But do not despair, for there are simple ways to prepare yourself. I have composed a few simple guidelines for those facing the End, prepared from my own recently graduated experience.

• Come up with some lies. This is an absolute essential. You are going to find that everyone from your hair stylist to your academic advisor to your smart-mouthed, cocky-in-her-freshman-status younger sister is going to want to know what your postgraduate plans are. I found it best to have a retinue of exciting scenarios. Aunt Suzanne was delighted to hear I was going to be attending Yale Law School; my hometown friends were impressed at my posh executive position at the Pixie Stick Corporation; and the man behind the post office counter was downright awed at my aspiration to become a real-life Warrior Princess. This will help you ward off having to make any pressing real-life choices and allow you to enjoy the time you have to its fullest potential.

• Apply to exotic and competitive scholarship programs. Find a foreign university and try to spend a year abroad studying Egyptology, Norwegian or golf. You don't actually have to stand a chance of being accepted, or even be particularly interested in the subject matter. Worst case scenario: You are rejected honorably, the program being a competitive one, and have something else to bring up when questioned. Best case scenario: You are accepted in a blaze of glory, and put off any other decisions for another year. Whee!

  N E X T_ P A G E .|. Mock, mock, mock!