FOCUS: Would you hire this man?

While the University was teeming with the parents this weekend, in town to witness one of their proudest moments - their child's college graduation - Steven Pessagno's thoughts were elsewhere. Pessagno was not talking about all the pomp and circumstance surrounding the milestone he would achieve the next day. Nor was he talking about jobs, for that matter. He was talking about shame - the "Wall of Shame," to be exact, a 9-foot by 10-foot expanse of wall in his apartment, where the College student and his housemates plastered rejection letter after rejection letter from prospective employers. Pessagno's story is simple, and for many of this year's graduates, all too familiar: "I'm unemployed right now," he said. The proof was on the wall. Many seniors, reached just days from graduation, reported that they, too, were still looking for jobs. Several of them, especially those in the College, said that they had interviewed extensively and sent resumes all over, but had no job to show of it. With media reports of gloom and doom for seniors entering the job market - The New York Times called this year's market the worst in 20 years for new graduates - and the economy's snail-pace recovery, it might seem as if many University graduates might as wel give up now. But despite popular perception of the individual horror stories, times may not be so terribly tough for this years graduating class. A number of the new graduates, particularly those from Wharton, Engineering and Nursing schools, said they were already fully employed. Several said they even had the luxury of picking from several offers. Officials with the University's Career Planning and Placement Service conceded that the job market is tight. But they said early indications suggest that students in those schools are enjoying considerable success in their job searches. Beverly Hamilton-Chandler, the CPPS associate director who handles Wharton, said that despite a slower pace this year, a slightly higher than usual number of Wharton graduate reported hiring to CPPS. "Wharton students overall have fared quite well," she said. "Given the number of responses ehat we've already received they seem to be quite happy. They're really in quite good shape." Donna Kahn Patkin, who oversees the Engineering School for CPPS, said: "Given a tough year, we've been pleased to hear that students have been able to find appropriate employment and things don't sound any differnet to us in terms of the actual jobs - so far." Even for students from the College, such as Steve Pessagno, who feel qualified and confident in their abilities, but have found only frustration in the job search so far - the near future may be brighter than they realize. According to Peggy Churchack, the CPPS assistant director in charge of the College, many students from the College wait longer than students from the University's other schools. She said many employers who seek the type of student with a degree from the College often do not hire ahead of time or recruit on campus - factors which mean many graduate from the College are still in the job hunt when graduation rolls around. Churchack even agrees that some of the skepticism felt by this year's graduates - and the resulting increases in applications to graduate schools - may be partially the result of the bad press about the job market. "It seems at least worthy of conjecture that part of this change is in fact people thinking, 'This market is so lousy, I might as well go to grad school,'" she said, although the average College graduate may be no less successful than those from previous years. Despite the different success rates experienced by students from the different schools, CPPS officials said students at the University have done well overall. "I think Penn students are doing better than most college seniors today," CPPS director Patricia Rose said. "Because of the quality of our students, we find that they're very successful in applying for jobs and getting accepted at graduate and professional schools." But even quality students need to plot out a thoughtful job search strategy for optimal success, several experts in career planning agreed this week. Victor Lindquist, the director of Northwestern University's career planning department and the author of a study on the job market, said this year's graduates need to focus on medium-size and smaller companies. He said tha many of the larger Fortune 500 companies, such as IBM are looking to downsize because of the recession, and will likely have fewer openings for new college graduates. In his study, the Linquist-Endicott Report, Lindquist notes that more than half of the companies surveyed said they would recruit less on college campuses this year than in 1991. The problem, according to career planning experts, is how to find jobs with smaller companies, which are often less visible than those with large corporations. CPPS's Rose said that she was "hopeful that [CPPS] will continue to forge relationships with [small to medium] companies" to increase opportunities for University students. But she also noted that the University's "traditional clients," the large corporations, would remain a top priority despite the drop in on-campus recruiting. Some of them, most notably Proctor & Gamble, continued interviewing and hiring University students this year. Still, as Lindquist noted, the majority of jobs available are at medium-size companies, and most of those openings never make it to the newspaper's ads. Insted, he said, they are usually filled internally through promotions or personal connections. Lindquist said that he had heard about a woman who mentioned to her hairdresser one day that her husband was having trouble finding a job as a financial analyst. Later that day, when another customer said her husband was looking to hire such a person, the hairdresser put the two in touch. The husband received the job shortly afterwards, complete with a $150,000 salary. "You need to develop contacts with anyone and everyone because you never know where the hell a job is going to come from," Linquist said. Rose agreed that networking is important. "At a time when the job market is tighter, you certainly want ot use every resource you can and networking is probably the most important," Rose said. She added that in addition to personal contacts, using the CPPS networks offers advantages as well. Dan Richter, a College graduate who majored in psychology, said a strong recommendation from a professor helped get him a plum research position at the National Institute of Mental Health. "I did O.K., but its a whole lot of 'who you know' and not 'what you know,'" he said. Another factor which often plays a role in the job seeker's ultimate success is the individual's commitment to a particular career or field of graduate study. Rose said the focus of students in the Nursing, Engineering and Wharton schools helps them do well, as it does for students in the College majoring in certain areas, such as economics, with clear post-University professional pathways. Phillip Gardner, a research administrator fro the Collegiate Employment Research Institute at Michigan State University, said graduates looking for work should zero in on a "specific target" and be prepared to "do a lot of knocking on doors" before finding a position. That's a lesson that Steven Pessagno said he did not learn until recently. The most disappointing part, I think, is more that I didn't know exactly what I wanted to do until I got into this process," he said, adding that he is confident he will find a job after returning from a 30-day trip through Europe this summer. As for where to find the jobs, the universal advice seems to be: head west and south and - at least for now - avoid the New England market. For a large percentage of this year's graduates, all the job advice in the world is of no use at the moment, because they are headed to graduate school. Rose estimates that among the University's graduates this year, applications to graduate school were up by about 10 percent overall. Many of the applicants planned on attending graduate school regardless of the state of the job market. In fact, CPPS officials said most medical school applicants had been planning on that path for some time due to the extensive requirements for such necessary steps as taking the Medical College Admissions Test. But for students like Jennifer Gray - who came out of the Engineering School with a degree in materials science and engineering, only to have "the hardest time finding a job" - graduate school seemed like the best option. She said she hopes graduate school will both buy her some time while the economy improves, and make her more desirable candidate for employers once she completes her graduate studies. There is at least one person who has not yet taken such a cerebral approach to post-University life is Catherine Ramsingh. "I haven't even started looking for a job," she said casually. "I'm going to relax for the summer, then take my time and look. You can't stress about these things." Of course 2,000 other graduates might beg to differ.