Science and New Zealand and Graduate Anxiety

Yesterday I went to an archaeology talk about radiocarbon dating and how it can be used in archaeological debates, specifically over the rise and collapse of the First Egyptian State. The talk itself was really interesting - Egypt! Science! I haven't studied any science since I was sixteen, and sometimes I really miss it. But what has really stuck in my head was when some of us, including the lecturer, went to the pub after.

Now, this lecturer is from New Zealand, and only came to the UK for his DPhil. We got onto talking about academia and careers and all that, and he brought up that, in his opinion, British students had a lot more expectations and pressures put on them than their NZ counterparts. Not only do you start specialising a lot earlier in the British system, but you're expected to go straight out of university into a good, graduate-level job and if you don't make it within a couple of years you've missed your window of opportunity. Whereas in NZ, it's pretty common to take a few years off after graduation, travel, live abroad (dear lord do Kiwis travel. Whenever I'm abroad there are New Zealander backpackers everywhere), and then settle down.

I think the thing about having a narrow window in which you're able to get a good job before the next generation of graduates overtakes you is worryingly true. My uncle is 26, and graduated in the recession from a very good university, but there was no way he could find a Good Job straight away, and he didn't really want to anyway. So he worked for a polo company and went to all sorts of places on tour with them, and travelled a bit, and worked as a chef back in his hometown... all things that he really enjoyed! But it meant that by the age of 23/24 he found it very difficult to get that Ideal Job that you're supposed to have, and after a half-hearted attempt at training to be a solicitor he ended up joining the army, to the thorough disapproval of almost the entire family.

I'm only in my second year of my degree, and I'm already supposed to be networking, getting internships, doing things that will appeal to future employers. But honestly, all I want to do after graduation is get back into the habit of reading non-fiction for pleasure (it's amazing how much hatred you can have for reading academic texts in your downtime after being surrounded by them for eight weeks) and to go travelling. I want to learn more languages and improve the ones I know, I want to work abroad, I want to do something utterly unrelated to my status as a BA graduate, like going back into music teaching.


But I'm afraid if I do that, I'll miss my chance. Wah wah life is unfair.