There’s a great series of student job search posts up at Phil’s Career Blog. The articles hit on three different students, their respective education paths, and how each one tends to move through the world. The advice Phil gives goes into pretty excellent detail based on each student and what skills/knowledge they each bring to the table.

Amy Achiever’s Traditional Search
Steve Striver’s Traditional Search
Bridget Blazer’s “Off Road” Search

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(job search)

The one thing no one tells new parents: Maybe don’t start shoveling aside the gargantuan pile of cash your kid will need for college. The one thing people never fail to ask new parents, after Girl or boy? and What’s its name?: How’s that college fund going? The You poor bastards is implied.

Any yahoo walking around advising parents to not start amassing gold bullion runs the risk of being smacked upside the head for sheer stupidity. However, one such individual (the only one I have ever heard of) does exactly that. Financial planner to new parents, Kristin Harad, explains to spanking new parental units that the college fund is about four down on the list of financial priorities.

Three items must be dealt with prior to starting the college fund:

Emergency Fund (enough to cover 6 months’ worth of expenses)
Retirement Fund (student loans exist, retirement loans do not)
Household Budget Under Control (spending less than you make)

Further Reading and Previous Posts:

You’re A Parent, Now Plan
Ways To Kick the Ass of Student Loan Debt
How To Avoid Graduating College Summa Cum Debt
Tax Breaks for Higher Education
Fall 2011 Facebook App for Financial Aid
College Grads and Student Loan Debt
Number-Crunching the Effects of Student Loans
Calculating Potential
Adventures in Education: Paying for College

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(image: college fund)

For the first few years of my college career, I was a cocky little sucker who was convinced that tutors were for the less-evolved, slower-thinking students on campus. Since I was “gifted” and had always been told that I was in possession of above average intelligence, I would of course be able to learn all college coursework instantly, perfectly, and with no assistance.

I know, what a dumb b**ch.

Because I’ve grown as a person, the irony of this is not lost on me: the “average” and “below average” kids showed higher levels of intelligence, common sense and basic survival skills than I had when they all joined study groups and headed to the tutoring center the first week of school.

It took me a few years, but I finally figured out that (a) I was going to actually have to work to learn all the material (sadly, no instantaneous absorption qualities do I possess), and (b) trying to get through college with no assistance just makes you look like a jackass. A jackass with a really expensive, crappy GPA.

The first trip to the tutoring center or to the prof’s office hours were the hardest. Once I got over the hump, I lived there. Later on, during Degree #2 I was technically in school full-time, but I was creatively spreading my classes out to mostly evening and online courses so I could be home with my infant daughter (only people who can hire drivers and butlers can afford childcare and tuition simultaneously). Which meant I was usually studying at home, halfway across Seattle, not on campus in the library where I could search out a classmate and ask a question about the homework.

I hated so much that feeling of being totally lost or confused by a physics or chem or calculus problem that I lost any self-consciousness associated with walking into the tutoring center, raising my hand before I even sat down, and asking for help. At some point, when my daughter was old enough to start preschool and I was on campus during the day like a real college student, I had the math tutoring center hours memorized and would just sit in there doing lab write-ups and math homework, raising my hand whenever I encountered a road block.

So the tutors saved my ass (once I managed to yank my own head out of it) and helped me figure out monumental, James Joyce-ian math and physics problems without ever giving me the answers or spoon-feeding me. I needed to understand how to do the problem, I didn’t want the answer. A tutor worth his or her salt never does the work for you. And if you find one who does, pray they’re tiny enough to fit inside your backpack so’s you can bring them along for exams.

Posted by Alexa Harrington

Science Professor (aka as Female Science Professor) over at Scientopia gave a reader some advice about whether or not it’s okay to date a senior colleague. Academia is a complex and many-layered animal with insane demands to make of any academic hoping for tenure. Dating an academic colleague with one’s the tenure vote still to come is a risky move, people. I’m with Female Science Professor on this one: my vote wouldn’t be altered by the colleague-dating situation, but it very well could be for others on the panel.

Does it suck hugely to have to walk away from possible love in order to attain one’s dream? Absolutely. But anyone who has already decided to pursue the nearly impossible tenure track has already announced loudly and with a barbaric yawp that they are more than willing to offer up their firstborn, their kidney, their hand, their mother, and several years of happiness to the tenure gods for even a smidgen of a sliver of a chance.

Humans are animals, and will do anything to survive and continue the species: food, sex (love), and survival, that’s all we need and are instinctively hell-bent of the pursuit of those goals. As far as I’ve seen, only tenure can veer an otherwise intelligent human animal away from food, sex and survival. (Wo)man up and realize how much you really want tenure, what you’re willing to give up for said dream, and walk the hell away from love until you’ve nailed down tenure.

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(Rockefeller University)

Tomorrow is the Nov. 5th SAT, which I can guarantee is freaking the crap right out of teenagers across the nation. Poor bastards. When I took the Rite of Passage for American High School Students (standardized tests written by pain-in-the-ass adults whose heads are shoved so far up their exit ramps that they can no longer navigate reality), I must say I had a rather cavalier attitude about the whole thing. Almost twelve years of public school had made me quite the badass standardized test taker; I was unconcerned.

Most students don’t have that attitude. To them I advise chilling the eff out, this is not the end of the world. I promise. Shite of a much higher magnitude will befall you in the course of your lifetime, I can guarantee it. So quit your whining and suck it up, kiddos. You walk right in there with your #2 pencils and kick some standardized ass! Or don’t, and head for your 5th choice school. No biggie.

Need some advice on SATs and ACTs and how they may affect your future matriculation plans? Allen Grove is a font of information about college admissions. Here are four of his bits of wisdom:

Low SAT or ACT Scores? These Colleges Don’t Require the Tests
What ACT Scores Do You Need to Get Into College?
Are My SAT Scores Good Enough?
Low ACT Scores? What Now?

Further Reading (my cranky attitude toward standardized tests in general):

Secret SAT Scores
Colbert’s Wickedly True Take on the SATs
Testing Season Begins
An Excellent Argument for Abolishing the SAT
The Newly Unfabulous SAT
Awesome Parent
The SAT Is Not Good
College Admissions Testing: For and Against
January 23rd SAT Results
Calculating Potential
Kaplan SAT Prep Tools on Facebook

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(image: panic)

Pamela Yellen over at the Huffington Post gives advice on How to Avoid Graduating College Summa Cum Debt. I’ve read dozens of articles on this topic over the years and none have irked me and impressed me with their proposals and solutions the way Yellen’s article has.

Her main piece of advice is to flat out not head off to college at all “unless or until you can afford it.” Not the standard higher education version of the American Dream. Usually everyone’s telling young adults to do whatever they and their parents can in order to acquire a college diploma, regardless of how many decades beyond graduation both parties will be swimming in debt.

Whether you agree with her or not, it’s interesting stuff to think about:

Four Paths to a Debt-Free College Education
1. Save it first.
2. Postpone it.
3. Do it smarter.
4. Skip it altogether.

Further Reading:

Ways to Kick the Ass of Student Loan Debt
Number-Crunching the Effects of Student Loans
Adventures in Education: Paying for College
The Economy and Higher Education
No One Likes a Recession
Calculating Potential
Investing in Students’ Futures
Extremely Useful Guidance for the Newly Salaried
Fall 2011 Facebook App for Financial Aid
College Grads and Student Loan Debt
Arne Duncan: Direct Student Loans
Increased Tuition Increases Some More

Posted by Alexa Harrington

Forbes contributor Robert W. Wood gives advice about which forms of higher education qualify for tax breaks. Wood lists the following articles for even more information on how to get a break from the IRS for funding one’s higher education pursuits:

Ten Rules for Deducting Career Education
Who benefits from student loans and educational tax benefits?
Two Tax Credits for Higher Education
IRS Publication 970: Business Deduction for Work Related Education
IRS Tax Topic 513: Educational Expenses
Deductibility of Work Related Educational Expenses
IRS: Tax Incentives for Higher Education

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(image: taxes)

Along the lines of my previous post regarding the much abhorred Epic Fail, Emily Chapman at Hack College wrote a piece advising one to Refuse to Dwell, Move On, Kick Ass. Well put.

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(photo: kick-ass)

Who needs more straight-up and simple financial advice than college students? Possibly only the city of Detroit. The always-awesome Ramit Sethi has yet to fix Detroit, but he has you covered.

Ramit’s suggestions for the three most basic, personal banking needs:

The Best Checking Account
The Best Savings Account
The Best Credit Card

Further Reading:

Financial Education
Financial Literacy for Graduates
“Unbundling College: How to Avoid Spending $100,000 (or more) on a Credential You Don’t Really Need”
How to Land a Mentor
Schools of Entrepreneurship

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(photo: credit card wreath)

UC Berkeley has a cool page on their site that allows you to click on any of their given majors and get a write-up of what you can do with said major (i.e., grad school, job). It’s fun to check out everything from underwater basket weaving (poli sci, psych, philosophy, etc.) to bioengineering and see the possible trajectories, especially if your parents are demanding proof that a degree in philosophy will lead to a prosperous future. Good luck with that.

Posted by Alexa Harrington

(photo: bioengineering)