Nothing says college graduation like receiving tons.of.terrible.advice!
At your graduation party usually the father of a roommate or an uncle twice removed, The Grad Party Downer’s one goal is to corner you with a piece of cake and ask you enough probing questions, and give you “real world advice” until you feel like there’s a rather large butcher knife in your quickly deflating grad balloon.
It’s not a tip per say, but a question asked with enough smirk that you know he’s going to enjoy watching your desperate attempt to spin I have no freakin clue.
The future?! Hell if I know. My goal was to graduate. I accomplished that goal. The future scares me more than finding a four-foot clown hiding in my closest.
6) I heard of this thing called Craigslist where you can find jobs
A bed frame? Yes. A date for Friday night? Scary, but probably. A job? Like a real-live employment opportunity that won’t involve you showing up to an abandoned warehouse to meet a guy Vito at 8:00 p.m.? Not sure.
5) Well did you know my son is only 25 years old and has an amazing job at…(fill in the blank). Why don’t you contact him for advice?
Here’s where the bulk of the conversation will rest.
Brag Son-Session 101.
And if you’re a girl, he’s probably going to elude more than once that it’s your lucky day because his son might also just be free tonight (imagine that!)
4) Have you tried getting an internship?
It’s not a terrible idea in itself — when you were in college. But now there’s these things called rent. college loans. grocery bills. car insurance. health insurance. etc. At least try to land a paid internship, if you can. Experience is invaluable in the next couple years, yes. Just don’t sell your young soul to get it.
3) I think you need to meet with your career planning office at school
Yes. Thank you. I tried that. And the one career fair they put on was top-notch. Sure it was 352 students for every one job, and that one job was selling toilet paper. But they did give me a button and a mouse pad. My future is all set.
2) I don’t envy you trying to find a job in this economy. But don’t worry too much. It’s all in God’s hands…
Thank you for that final punch to the kidneys.
1) And the #1 worse tip…well you tell me. What do you think is the worse tip to give a recent college grad?
The college graduation speech is kind of like grocery store graduation cake — lots of sweet fluff that’s going to make you nauseous later.
It’s not that I don’t like the Ra-Ra, Change the World, Be the Difference graduation speech. It’s just that it’s about twenty years removed from the real world advice college grads need.
I’d like a 28 year old (funny, that’s how old I am), who’s gone through hell and back, to jump on stage and give tips that go something like this:
Photo Credit: John McStravick – Creative Commons
Top 5 Things We Should Have Heard at College Graduation
5. Your fellow graduates could care less about your life.
Look to the person next to you and say, I DO NOT care what you do with your life. Don’t live for me. Live for you.
Every one’s so obsessed with putting their PR spins on their own Facebook profile, they’re not going to worry much about yours. Kill Compulsive Comparison Disorderbefore it starts.
4.Ross - The discount clothing store is now your best friend.
Because you can’t really afford business clothes and at Ross you really can dress for less. But good luck trying to find that one light-blue button up shirt that’s not XXL or those black, size 6 1/2 women’s shoes.
3.Employer’s DO NOT care about your 3.53 GPA.
I know you worked hard for it and are so proud – but the world outside of college cares very little about GPA unless it’s a 4.0 from Harvard. If you explain why your excellent GPA translates into how much freaking money you’re going to make the company – well then watch their eyes light up…
2. How you fail is more important than how you succeed.
It’s inevitable. At some point in the next week, month, year, you willfail and fail big and fail repeatedly. You will fall flat on your face, adding another scar to the collection.
And to failing I say, great! If younever fail, then you’re not risking. You’re living your life not to get hurt. But living a life of self-preservation will get you killed, but it will be a slow-death. Drips of monotony failing on your comfortable life until you go insane. So fail. Fail big. Justdon’t call yourself a failure. That’s key.
And the #1 thing we should’ve heard at college graduation…….
Well you tell us. What do you wish you’d heard at college graduation?
You pray and pray for this day to finally come and once it does, you’re thrown into a blender of joy, fear, excitement, anticipation, gas, and hopeful expectancy — mixing your insides into an unrecognizable blend of emotions.
Don’t worry, All Groan Up is here to help sort things out. All this week All Groan Up will be devoted to this most blessed life-changing, graduation event.
And to kick things off, if you’re going to do college graduation right you’re going to need the right songs. All Groan Up has scoured the web and the world for the fourteen best songs to ring in graduation like the pro you are.
Photo D.R. Davis – Creative Commons
Top 14 college graduation songs over the last 40 years
To get on this exclusive list the song needs to 1). Pull on the old heart strings. 2). Make you feel smothered in nostalgia. And 3). Been played at a minimum of 7,328 graduation party’s.
(I’ve been gathering this data since I graduated – 7 years ago. Wow has it been that long?)
14. Here’s to the Night — Eve 6
Here’s to the Night is your classic 90′s, sitting in a corner of a big grad party drinking from your red plastic cup as nostalgia overtakes you like an unbridled avalanche, graduation song. Drink it in at number fourteen on the countdown.
13. Another Brick in the Wall (Part Two) — Pink Floyd
“We don’t need no education”
A classic 70’s education protest song that would make your Aunt Martha blush.
12. Graduation — Vitamin C
I want to take the corner of my graduation cap and jab my ear out when I hear this one. Vitamin C sings a deliberate, non-nuanced graduation song that makes you wish graduation would just end already. But alas, it’s still here on the list at #12.
11. Unwritten — Natasha Bedingfield:
“Today is where your book begins. The rest is still unwritten.”
And in six months is when your loan repayments begin. So write in that book as much as possible before Sallie Mae tries to repossess it. Luckily Unwritten is so upbeat it makes you forget about silly reality. So go grab the real world by the ears and snarl at it.
10. Today — Smashing Pumpkins
“Today is the greatest day I’ve ever known“
You wouldn’t know it was the greatest day by the way Billy Corgan sings it, but the greatest day it is. Or maybe not. Or is.
9. Dog Days are Over — Florence + The Machine
Has nothing to do with graduation per say, but she sings the dog days are over… over and over again. What’s more fitting than that?
8. Time of My Life — Bill Medley
The 80’s are now represented on the countdown with this feel good dance tune. Time of My Life is best remembered as the Dirty Dancing song. But play it at your graduation party and the whole guest list might join in a choreographed dance that would make Patrick Swayze proud.
7. Time of Your Life (Good Riddance) – Green Day
Another Time of Your Life tune with a slightly different feel. Green Day makes you want to curl up with your acoustic guitar and just have a good graduation cry.
6. School’s Out — Alice Cooper
“School’s out forever”
Need I say more?
5. Vienna — Billy Joel
“If you’re so smart tell me why you’re still so afraid. Dream on but don’t imagine that they’ll all come true.”
Billy Joel comes in at number five with a not-so-feel-good graduation tune. This song is kind of like your uncle after a few drinks shooting you straight about life in the real world.
4. Graduate — Third Eye Blind
“Can I graduate?”
Well yes, you just did. Raise that diploma high and rock out to Third Eye Blind doing their graduation thing.
Really? Number two? Yes. He’s the boss. You want to argue with him?
1. Friends are Friends Forever – Michael W. Smith
When that synthesizer plays its first note, a lone tear trickles down my cheek every time.
If you didn’t grow up in a Christian school, you might not have even heard this 80’s ode to graduation, friends, and teardrops. But Friends are Friends Forever is definitely the cheesiest, classiest of all graduation songs. This song will make you want to hold hands in a circle and never let go.
Have any memories playing one of these songs at your graduation party?
We’ve been told our whole lives to keep climbing the stairs. Grade school, middle school, High school, to college, to a major, to graduation — each step lined with blue ribbons, good grades, and gold medals, omens to us that we are going to rock the world once we actually enter it.
But what happens when we actually get off the stairs and start exploring the unknowns of the proverbial “15th floor”? Are we welcomed by cherub angels singing our praises while showering us with cash. Or a disgruntled mid-manager sporting a wicked comb-over who laughs in the face of our resume like it’s some sort of stand-up comedy routine?
The video below is what happens to us when we stop climbing and start exploring the 15th floor. What will we find??? Watch below to find out, and then share with us your experiences on the “15th floor”.
And the Chalkboard Comment of the Week for last week’s question “If My 20′s Were a Movie…” comes from Emily! She wrote “cinematic pinache,” encapsulated the paradox of our 20′s amazingly well, and found $20 at the end! I see a movie deal by June.
Can’t wait to see all the Groan Up wisdom for these college grads…
