College is not job training
Letter to the Editor
The letter on Feb. 15 from two seniors concerning jobs for Arts and Letters students and post-graduate service programs took me right back to many of the concerns that I felt as a student nearing the end of my life at Notre Dame, as well as to the anxieties many feel as they near their time in our program.
As the Director of Holy Cross Associates, one of the "service projects" mentioned in the letter, I have many opportunities to listen to post-graduate volunteers as they begin the "what next" process. I encourage them to think of the feelings of anxiety that naturally come with life changes as a mass of possibilities, not a lack of opportunities. There are lots of jobs out there for folks with all kinds of backgrounds, even if they seem harder to find in certain major fields or do not appear as financially lucrative as what one might find had one pursued other majors.
If one takes as a viewpoint the notion that college education is primarily job training, then one is likely to be disappointed no matter the chosen field of studies. If, on the other hand, one views it as a means of further discovering a vocation, then all the experiences — classes, projects, relationships, hall masses, athletics; all of college life — help students to uncover their vocations, the gifts one possess to put to the best use of him or herself and the community. By vocation, I refer to the many life paths one can choose. Good colleges and universities would do tremendous disservice to students if they only encouraged the development of job skills. Further, schools like Notre Dame and Saint Mary's and others steeped in strong faith traditions would do much poorer by its students if they did not encourage an even deeper exploration of vocation in the context of one's gifts as God given and meant to be discerned and discovered by commitment and experience.
In this light, programs like Holy Cross Associates, ACE and many others provide a context for this exploration. Our program stresses the idea that one's call is not (necessarily) found on graduation day, but rather a continuous journey taking one through the possibilities of vocation as family members, single people, religious life, and many other callings. Most participants in our program will tell a listener that they discovered many things about themselves and their callings, but that the experiences moved them farther away from thinking that they had discovered what their job should be in the future. It becomes better understood as a lifelong journey.
I encourage readers, particularly those reaching the end of their tenures at school, to consider all the possibilities available to them, including the possibility of service in a post-graduate program. Their rewards don't include lucrative sums of money, but the experiences linger for a lifetime.
John Pinter, '81
Director, Holy Cross Associates
February 16, 2000
All Viewpoint Stories for Friday, February 18, 2000
