0:00 Look at the employment picture in
0:01 Alabama tonight. According to the state
0:03 department of labor, 3.3% of Alamians
0:06 are unemployed as of March of this year.
0:09 Green County has the highest
0:11 unemployment rate at 7.7%. Shelby County
0:14 has the lowest at
0:16 2.7%. We wondered how the current job
0:19 market is looking for graduating college
0:21 seniors. CBS 42's Mattie McQueen went to
0:25 find out.
0:27 College graduation is usually a very
0:29 happy time. Celebrating a great
0:31 milestone and accomplishment, but as
0:34 many students told me today, the job
0:36 market is tough right now, bringing with
0:38 it some stress about what happens after
0:41 they turn the tassel. It gets annoying,
0:43 but I I need to make money. I need a
0:45 job. Jameson Marshall began applying to
0:47 jobs in the fall. He sent out at least
0:50 60 applications to only hear back from a
0:52 handful. He started a new tactic on his
0:55 job hunt. They're not going to see just
0:57 a resume online. Call them. Like, let
0:59 them remember some sort of something.
1:01 Once you like start doing it, like you
1:02 call call somewhere, they're not going
1:04 to be like mean to you. And the job hunt
1:07 is still on for Janna Ronaldo, too.
1:10 She's only heard back from three jobs
1:12 out of the more than 70 applications she
1:15 sent in. I took some steps and uh I paid
1:17 someone to go over my resume and redo
1:19 it. I'm hoping that helped. It's
1:21 definitely just I don't have the
1:22 experience needed even with all the
1:24 internships. Some graduating University
1:27 of Alabama students say the lack of
1:29 experience is a problem for many trying
1:31 to enter the workforce. I think a lot of
1:33 companies also like are going through
1:35 things like hiring freezes. So, it's
1:37 just hard to even like find a job to
1:38 apply for and then if you're competing
1:40 with people within the company. Both
1:42 Haley Killian and Khloe Rickley get to
1:44 skip the job hunt this year as they head
1:46 into grad school. The second everyone
1:48 was applying for jobs, I literally said,
1:50 "I'm so relieved that I'm going back to
1:51 school and I don't have to be doing this
1:52 right now." Some graduating students
1:54 like Travonda Ward believe it now takes
1:57 more and more schooling to land a job.
1:59 And this is actually my second master's
2:01 degree. So, I'm just trying to get as
2:04 much as I can to make myself more
2:07 marketable to employers. Given the
2:09 current job market, students like Ross
2:11 Boseman feel grateful to have a job
2:13 lined up after graduation. I was one of
2:15 the lucky ones. So, I I feel for them a
2:18 lot. I I know one of my friends is
2:19 moving to Nashville and she's moving
2:22 without a job, without a paycheck, and I
2:24 feel I just feel for her. According to
2:26 the National Association of Colleges and
2:28 Employers, employers are planning to
2:30 hire less than 1% of new college
2:32 graduates from the class of 2025.
2:35 Reporting in Tuscaloosa, Mattie McQueen,
2:37 CBS42 News.
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