![]() If he could, Ruark says, he would go back to the time he was in third grade when his mom - also a schoolteacher - told him he had a gift for teaching and encouraged him to pursue it. We laugh about it now, but to think about it, was a waste of time and energy." "What's interesting is, after talking about it with them, I realized all my friends had the same anxieties about perceiving others' successes. "I had anxiety because my friends were finding jobs, and I perceived them as being wildly successful while I wasn't," Ruark says. Ruark, now 35 and living in Jeffersonville, Vermont, remembers how stressful it felt to be directionless right after school. When he discovered a knack for it, he got certified to teach full time with a focus on high school science. He almost became a police officer before he finally stumbled into substitute teaching. He spent the next three years figuring out his options, first thinking to join the military until his health prevented him from doing so, then taking the LSATs with the intention to go to law school. He graduated from college in 2007 just as the economy began to nose-dive into the Great Recession, and many jobs he thought of trying out went away with it. A history degree and few job opportunitiesįor Lee Ruark, earning a history degree was all part of the plan to start a career - he just didn't know what he wanted to use his degree for. We talked with six people from a range of fields about what they would do differently if they could start over again. ![]() adults ages 33 to 40, conducted by The Harris Poll on behalf of CNBC Make It.Īlfenito believes millennials, who this year range in age from 25 to 40 and make up the largest age group in the workforce, were pressured to pursue four-year degrees, and the mountains of debt that can come with them, without always knowing if there was a viable career on the other side of graduation.Īs older millennials approach two decades in the workforce, their current roles and responsibilities may not be what they envisioned out of high school or college. Nearly half, 47%, say they wish they had chosen a different career path when they started out, according to a recent survey of 1,000 U.S. Many older millennials who are now approaching middle age have significant career regrets. Thinking back to her college days, "I wish someone had helped me figure out what jobs would be applicable for my interests and passions, and what kind of degree was actually required for that - if any," Alfenito says. Then, she says, she was diagnosed with cancer, dropped out and became "resigned to working in food service or retail for the foreseeable future." Today, Alfenito works as a cashier at a bakery in Morgantown, West Virginia. For the last 16 years, she has held a string of jobs, starting with two part-time gigs while attending college for musical theater.
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