A graduating college senior faces a dire job market and chooses optimism

THE nagging question asked during senior year of college is, "What are your plans after graduation?"

As the University of Washington commencement draws closer, my response is always the same, "Work." In reality, with the current economy, it's more a hope than a plan.

I joke with my mother, saying I should try harder to find a millionaire for a husband instead of job-seeking, but after looking into it, I realize those types of matchmaking services require candidates to have careers first. Go figure.

With Washington unemployment rates hovering around 10 percent, my anxiety continues to climb. Spending sometimes hours a day sending out resumes and cover letters, the response I receive is the same. Nothing.

I imagine employers so bogged down by innumerable resumes that their computer systems lose power, so much so they never get to mine. As I continue reading stories about hotels receiving thousands of applicants for a front-desk job, I don't think this scenario is too far-fetched.

Despite circumstances like this, Americans recently received good news. Consumer spending, which makes up about 70 percent of the country's economic activity, increased 0.6 percent in March, the largest increase in months.

The bad news? The spending increase is double the increase in income, and the rate of savings fell. While it's important our economy expands, this type of growth won't be sustainable if jobs do not follow. Yet analysts expect unemployment to stay the same the rest of the year.

Those most deserving of jobs are getting discouraged, like a friend who toils well into the night day after day on architecture projects but has received a swift "No!" from only two out of the dozens of firms he has applied to. The other companies didn't bother to respond. A few friends are moving to South Korea for a guaranteed salary teaching English. The rest, at this point, have adopted an "I'll take anything" mentality.

This outlook runs the risk of negatively affecting careers far into the future. With the economy, graduates accept jobs that pay less and stay in them longer, which ultimately limits opportunities for professional growth.

I am trying to chase that attitude away for as long as possible, not because of optimism, but because it makes me angrier than I could express in words fit for publication. I have spent the last four years killing myself while balancing classes, a job and internships, I will be graduating with a good GPA and academic awards, and I have to settle for just about anything?

I understand my ideal career won't be handed to me on a silver platter. If college has taught me anything, it's that great rewards require hard work. But if I end up with a job I could have had out of high school, which isn't unheard of for college graduates my age, I'm going to be a little bitter, and that's an understatement.

So what's a college grad supposed to do? I've listened to advice from one professor. Grim and gut-wrenchingly true, she explained that people with far more experience than I have been out of work for a while, so it's going to take a long time to get the job I want.

I've tempered that guidance with words from my mother, who is much more of an optimist:

"The future holds great things for you."

And I truly believe it does. I'm going to keep sending out resume after resume, and wait. It's really all I can do right now.

In the meantime, I'll also continue working on my application to the matchmaker who connects eligible young women with Seattle's available millionaires.

Shauna Nuckles is a senior at the University of Washington and Seattle Times editorial page intern. E-mail her at snuckles@seattletimes.com