There is one question you are not to pose to an LSA senior: "So what are you doing after graduation?"
You do not, repeat, do not say such a thing. It is wrong. It is mean-spirited. It is wholly unnecessary. Pray tell, just what kind of answer do you expect? "I'm taking my stinking liberal arts degree straight to the waitstaff of my neighborhood bar and grill," is what you are likely to get.
Of course, LSA seniors, there is help. Help comes in the form of Jessica Fein's "Moving On: How to Make the Transition from College to the Real World" (Plume, 1996), a handy little book written by one of our very own. Fein is a 1990 LSA graduate, and she's here to help; she'll be at Borders tonight at 7:30.
Of course, as any book editor at any college newspaper will tell you, there are hundreds of these books on the market. Books with titles like "How to Have Angst," "I Hate the World, Let's Move to Seattle!," and "Scammin' Money from the Man"; books aimed at getting money from indebted college graduates.
But "Moving On" is one of the best of the lot, and it's actually quite useful. It's full of tips on everything to the physical act of moving to roommates and redecorating to resumes and job hunts. Plus it's compact and terse - no superfluous ramblings here. And best of all, it's full of real-life anecdotes that instruct as well as reassure. If you feel like you are about to be uprooted into a world where you don't belong, "Moving On" may help you feel a bit more at ease. If nothing else, you won't feel abnormal in your anxiety.
Fein said that she had a simple motive in writing this book: "Basically, I wrote the book that I wished I had had when I graduated from college."
Oh yes, Fein's graduation, the day after which she and two friends packed up all their belongings into a U-haul and headed out of Ann Arbor. They arrived in Washington, D.C., where, in the most simplified terms, they were homeless for a month.
Fein says her rather uncertain condition mirrored what was happening with her recently graduated friends around the country. "There were so many new situations for us," Fein said. "All of my friends were just scrambling around trying to adjust to a new lifestyle with a limited amount of funds."
She said her book is as complete as it can possibly be; that is, she tries to cover all the things that can happen in a recent graduate's life. "This book covers all of the phases, from packing boxes to renting trucks to the emotional aspects of moving."
And there certainly are some emotional aspects to the post-college move, Fein said. Among them, Fein said, is the natural tendency to measure success against the success of your peers. "Lots of people start to compare themselvs to their friends. But people are moving at rapidly different paces during that time of life. You and your friends, who just a few months ago were all doing the same sort of stuff, are now doing very different things."
College provides a common ground for all students, one in which school and social lives usually are the two top concerns. Fein said that adjusting to a post-college social scene is difficult: Your friends are scattered around and you spend a lot of your waking hours at work. "College is one gigantic social experience," Fein said. "Your social life is handed to you on a silver platter."
In "Moving On," Fein spends a significant amount of time dealing with the establishment of a post-college social, highlighting the fact that friends are necessary for sanity and security. From roommates to romance, Fein deals with the often-ignored question of making friends away from school.
In short, "Moving On" details all the aspects of the major, life-changing event - Graduation Day. Fein takes the reader through a large number of post-graduation possibilities, in a cool, engaging tone, which doesn't add to the already mounting pressure. After Graduation Day, Fein said, "For the first time there are not set expectations. You have to make your own choices."
"Moving On" can help.