Job hurdles for migrant grads

June 20, 2010 | Posted by Chris

Recent college graduates that have moved to Beijing from the countryside face a number of challenges entering the job market in the capital city, an article published today in Newsweek discusses. The main challenge is universal to college graduates throughout China: college grads far outnumber job opportunities in the country's most developed cities. But being outsiders without local relationships and proper legal resident status -- and few resources to support themselves -- these smart and ambitious grads face additional hurdles to being successful in their adopted hometown. So as they seek to cultivate the professional experience that will catapult their careers, these graduates live in squalid complexes outside Beijing's fifth ring road, often commuting 3 hours or more each day to the jobs they are able to secure. Despite such difficulties, however, these migrant graduates are determined to give what it takes to make it, the article concludes: "I'll go back to my hometown only after I've learned everything the city can teach me. I'd have my own company and buy an apartment," says Wang Lei, who dreams of being the first software entrepreneur in his Gansu Province village.

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