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Unemployment rates among college graduates ages 20 to 24 was 7.7 percent last year (Thomas Wells)
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Perrin Crews recently graduated from the University of Mississippi with degrees in political science and Spanish.
Despite academic accomplishments that included enrollment in the Barksdale Honors College at Ole Miss, he is not immediately headed into the workforce.
“Right now everything is up in the air,” he said, “I’m just exploring different options.”
Crews is one of many new college graduates facing entry into a tough job market, despite slight improvements in the national overall unemployment level. The national unemployment level fell 0.4 percent from January to March of this year, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Crews said he is “glad to be out of school and into the real world” and has had a job offer from a nonprofit organization.
For now, Crews would like to spend time abroad, possibly teaching English, at least in the short-term.
Mississippi still has one of the nation’s highest unemployment rates at 9.4 percent, compared with an average of 6.5 percent in 2007, right before the recession put the brakes on the economy. Lee County has struggled in recent years with unemployment rates above 10 percent as recently as 2010. The most recent unemployment rate in the county was 7.9 percent, slightly higher than the national average.
Higher than usual unemployment means a larger pool of available labor for employers to chose from, and thus fewer opportunities for recent college graduates with little or no real work experience.
Crews said that among his classmates, the only people he knew graduating with jobs were in accounting. Many others, he said, would go to graduate school.
A national survey by CareerBuilder this month showed the college major in highest demand by employers was business at 31 percent, followed by computer and information services at 24 percent.
The same survey showed that the industry with the largest increase in the availability of entry level jobs was advertising, with a 55 percent increase, followed by computer science (37 percent) and accounting and finance (36 percent).
Still, the largest overall number of entry level jobs available nationwide are in nursing.
Lisa Lamberth, a 2012 graduate from Mississippi State University, has spent the last year working for BancorpSouth in Tupelo. She said it was luck finding a job because someone she knew was leaving.
With a degree in biochemistry, Lamberth positioned herself well and was accepted to begin dental school at the University of Mississippi Medical Center this fall. She said the year working at home has been helpful.
“I just kind of had a year off to work. ... it was really good to save up some money,” she said.
Krista Reed, branch manager at Select Staffing in Tupelo, said working, even if you don’t find the ideal position, is the better option for grads.
“Find something; get a job,” she said.
She said that while it is her goal to find permanent placement for college graduates, even temporary, transitional work will make a difference to future employers.
“Employers steer clear of folks that have not been employed for a while,” Reed said.
Reed said the demand for temporary workers has been high in recent months, with as many as 20 positions open, though now she is working to fill about five positions. She said the agency has spots available for both skilled and unskilled workers.
Still, those who do earn four-year degrees fare better than those who do not. In the US, the 2012 unemployment rate for ages 20 to 24 among college graduates was 7.7 percent, compared to 17.7 percent of non-graduates in the same age group, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
Those rates for both groups are higher in light of national economic woes. The jobless rate for graduates increased only 2.2 percentage points over the previous five years compared with a jump of 7.6 percentage points for non-grads.
The 2007 rate of unemployment for college graduates in the same age group was 5.4 percent, compared with 10.1 percent for non-graduates.
Market analysts are hopeful that as the economy continues to recover, employment rates will follow suit. Crews said that although he wants to live and work abroad for a while, he plans to return to the state eventually. “Mississippi is always home,” he said.
sarah.robinson@journalinc.com
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EDMOND, OKLA. — One of several tornadoes spawned by a powerful storm system rumbling through the Plains and Midwest has leveled several mobile homes in an area southeast of Oklahoma City.
Reports of injuries in the mobile home park near Shawnee about 35 miles southeast of Oklahoma City couldn't immediately be confirmed.
A storm spotter has told the National Weather Service that the tornado "scoured" the landscape in the park and an area along Interstate 40.
The highway has been closed because of overturned tractor-trailers that now litter the road. Television footage showed the twister approaching an area near the Shawnee Reservoir.
Severe storms roared through the Plains and Midwest on Sunday, spawning tornadoes that damaged buildings, ripped off roofs and tossed big trucks like toys in Oklahoma.
Another tornado kicked up debris in Wichita, Kan., and a tornado was reported near Des Moines, Iowa.
There were no immediate reports of injuries caused by the funnel cloud that touched down in the Oklahoma City suburb of Edmond before moving off to the northeast.
KFOR-TV showed footage of homes damaged and cars and trucks flipped from highways near Shawnee, Okla. Other video showed flashes from electrical transformers blowing out as they were hit by high winds or debris from the tornado near Edmond.
Sedgwick County, Kan., emergency management director Randy Duncan says officials are grateful for few reports of damage from a tornado that touched down near Wichita Mid-Continent Airport. He told CNN the area emerged "relatively unscathed.''
Tornado watches were posted from Oklahoma to southern Minnesota. Forecasters had been warning for days that severe storms were likely across the region.
"I knew it was coming," said Randy Grau, who huddled with his wife and two young boys in their Edmond's home when the tornado hit. He said he peered out his window as the weather worsened and believed he saw a flock of birds heading down the street. "Then I realized it was swirling debris.''
In Iowa, a tornado touched down about 30 miles west of Des Moines near the town of Earlham, the Des Moines Register reported. It was moving northeast at 55 mph toward Adel, according to the National Weather Service.
The National Weather Service said it was tracking a confirmed tornado near Edmond, Okla., moving east at 30 mph around 4:19 p.m. CT.
The National Weather Service described the Oklahoma City area tornado as "large, violent and extremely dangerous.''
A helicopter pilot following the storm captured footage of an apparent funnel cloud near Wellston, Okla.
The Storm Prediction Center in Norman, Okla., said there is a risk of strong tornadoes in central parts of the state Sunday.
Forecasters say the storms — which could also bring large hail and damaging winds — are expected to form Sunday afternoon and that the advised area also includes portions of Kansas, Missouri and Nebraska.
In central Iowa, Sunday and the beginning of the week are "the biggest chance we've had for severe weather since 2011," forecasters at the National Weather Service told the Des Moines Register.
COLUMBUS – Authorities recovered the body of a 10-year-old boy who apparently drowned after an all-terrain vehicle overturned in a Mississippi creek, but the search for his younger brother continued Sunday.
Columbus Fire Chief Kenneth Moore said Justin Brown’s body was found Sunday afternoon about a mile south of where the accident occurred.
A team of roughly three dozen people was using four boats and a helicopter to search for his 6-year-old brother, Jacob.
“We’ll go until it’s dark and can’t see anymore,” Moore said Sunday.
On Saturday afternoon, an ATV carrying the two boys, their father and three other people was crossing a spillway where the rain-swollen Magby and Luxapalila creeks intersect when a strong current flipped the vehicle, which the boys’ father was driving, according to Moore.
“The current was so strong it rolled the ATV down the spillway into the river,” he said. “That (water) is normally not deep and not swift.”
Moore said the current swept the boys into a part of the Luxapalila Creek that is up to 12 feet deep. Two other passengers had to be rescued from the water by people on shore, he added.
Unemployment rates among college graduates ages 20 to 24 was 7.7 percent last year (Thomas Wells)
New college graduates struggle to find work
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Oklahoma City tornado 'scours' landscape, levels homes
May 19, 2013 | 622 views | 0 | 1 | |
| 1 | | Jerry Dirks, at right, hugs her friend Earlene Langley after a tornado hit Driks' home just south of Carney Okla., on Sunday, May 19, 2013. Dirks was in her cellar at the time the tornado hit. (AP Photo/The Oklahoman, Bryan Terry)
Jerry Dirks, at right, hugs her friend Earlene Langley after a tornado hit Driks' home just south of Carney Okla., on Sunday, May 19, 2013. Dirks was in her cellar at the time the tornado hit. (AP Photo/The Oklahoman, Bryan Terry)
UPDATE: Boy dead, brother missing after ATV accident
May 19, 2013 | 3721 views | 0 | 1 | |
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