Shulou(Shulou.com)11/24 Report--

As big technology companies such as Google, Meta and Amazon cut jobs, suspend or slow hiring, computer science majors who once wanted to break into the technology industry and get a high-paying job are facing new choices. Some people are starting to lower their expectations, while others are looking for new technology jobs outside the technology industry.

The following is the translation of the source Pixabay:

Since studying together in Seattle, Annalice Ni has wanted to develop software for well-known technology companies like Google. As a result, she has been doing her best to make her experience meet the internship and other resume criteria needed to get into such a large company.

In high school, Ms. Ni took computer science courses, had an internship at Microsoft, and volunteered as a programming teacher for junior students. She majored in computer science at the University of Washington and received an enviable internship in Facebook software engineering. After graduating from college this year, Ms. Ni came to Silicon Valley to become a software engineer at Meta, the parent company of Facebook, and started her dream job.

Last month, Meta laid off more than 11000 employees, including Ms. Ni.

"I do feel very frustrated and disappointed, and maybe a little scared, because all of a sudden, I don't know what to do," Ms. Ni, 22, said of unexpected career setbacks. "I did my best. Especially in college, I can do all I can, and I can't do more or better."

Over the past decade, six-figure starting salaries, free meals and other benefits, and the opportunity to develop applications used by billions of users, have caused young people on college campuses across the United States to flock to computer science majors. Spend energy on computer programming languages and algorithms. According to computer-related degree data from about 200 universities tracked by the American Association for computer Research (Computing Research Association), the number of undergraduates majoring in computer science more than tripled to nearly 136000 between 2011 and 2021.

Technology giants such as Facebook, Google and Microsoft have also boomed the computer education industry, convincing college students that software development is a path to a well-paid career and a world-changing force.

But now technology companies such as Meta, Alphabet, DoorDash, Lyft, Snap, Stripe, Twitter and Amazon are cutting jobs, suspending or slowing hiring, which has had a big impact on a generation of computer and data science students.

These students have spent years honing themselves and are preparing to work for the largest technology companies. But the layoffs not only force recent computer science graduates to look for new jobs, but also bring more uncertainty to those who want to intern at large consumer technology companies.

In the past, technology companies used internship programs to recruit more promising job seekers, providing many college students with the opportunity to become full-time employees after graduation. But this year, these opportunities are diminishing.

Amazon, for example, hired about 18000 interns this year and paid nearly $30, 000 for summer internships to some computer science students, excluding housing subsidies. The company is considering more than halving the number of interns next year, according to a person familiar with Amazon's internship program.

Amazon spokesman Brad Grasser (Brad Glasser) said the company is committed to expanding internship programs to provide college students with real work experience. A spokesman for Meta referred to a letter from CEO Mark Zuckerberg to all employees last month announcing layoffs.

Hiring plans for small technology companies are also quietly changing. Roblox, a popular gaming platform, says it plans to hire 300 interns next summer, almost twice as many as this year, but expects more than 50,000 to apply for these internships. By contrast, Redfin hired only 38 interns this summer, and the company said it had cancelled next year's internship program.

In any case, college students majoring in computer science still have relatively good job choices, and the field is still growing. According to projections from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics (Bureau of Labor Statistics), jobs for software developers and testers are expected to grow by 25% between 2021 and 2031, or more than 411000 jobs, many of them in areas such as finance and the automotive industry.

"students still get a lot of job offers," says Brent Winkelman, dean of computer science at the University of Texas at Austin. "but it may not come from well-known technology companies such as Meta, Twitter or Amazon, but from companies such as GM, Toyota or Lockheed."

Many anxious students who are about to enter the technology job market turn to university job centers for help. In the office of a career counselor, more and more college students are asking how to make a B plan for finding a job.

Some students are applying to lesser-known technology companies, while others are looking for technology jobs outside the technology industry, such as working for retailers such as Wal-Mart, or government agencies and non-profits. In addition, graduate school is also a choice.

"this discipline is much more flexible than it used to be," says Hazel Raja, senior director of the career development office at Pomona College in Claremont, Calif. "even students who have found jobs will actively participate in campus recruitment opportunities to ensure more networking."

Helen Dong, 21, a senior majoring in computer science at Carnegie Mellon University, interned at Meta twice in 2021 and 2022. So she said she was surprised when she didn't get a job offer from Meta at the end of this summer. Meta's recent massive layoffs prompted the senior to send his resume to auto and finance companies outside the technology industry. Last month, she posted a video on TikTok advising her peers to adjust their job expectations.

"I chose computer science, and I thought I could get a lot of job offers and make a lot of money after graduating from college," Ms. Dong joked in the TikTok video, singing "reduce your expectations to zero" (Reduce Your Expectations to 0). In such a job market, "if you can get a job, be grateful," she wrote at the bottom of the video. "

More than a dozen college students and recent graduates said in interviews that they were not prepared for a slowdown in hiring by large technology companies. After all, these companies are still competing fiercely for computer science majors at top schools these days. Some students have received multiple job offers with a starting salary of six figures and a signing bonus of five figures. There is a type of video on TikTok that promotes the job benefits and annual salaries of large technology companies to young technicians, including videos that emphasize that these companies are paid nearly $200000 a year.

However, dozens of recently laid-off technology company employees, or those who have received technical job offers but have been cancelled, have described their difficulties on the recruitment platform LinkedIn. To remind recruiters at major companies, some have added a # opentowork tag to their LinkedIn profile photos showing that they are looking for a job.

Tony Shi, 23, is one of them. He majored in computer science and business at Western University University in London, Ontario, Canada. After graduating this year, Mr. Shi began to work as a product manager at Lyft in August. But the company laid off about 650 employees in November, including Mr. Shi, a recent graduate.

Now he is going to find a new job, and time is running out. Mr. Shi, a Canadian, was granted a work visa to stay in San Francisco because he worked at Lyft. According to the visa requirements, he has 60 days to find a new job. Mr Shi says he has become more sensitive to the business performance and balance sheet of potential employers.

"I need to be risk-averse. I definitely don't want to get fired again." He said he would no longer believe what a company boasted, but that, "now the company's products have to be meaningful."

By contrast, some fresh college graduates do not have the opportunity to work in the technology industry.

Rachel Rachel Castellino, a statistics student at California State Polytechnic University (California Polytechnic State University), has always wanted to get a job at a big technology company. In college, she interned at payment platform PayPal, worked as a project manager, won a data science scholarship funded by the National Science Foundation, and led the establishment of a data science club at the school.

Castellino, 22, knows that interviews at technology companies often involve solving programming problems, and he has to work hard to pass technical interviews at these companies. Last year, she spent most of her fall looking for a job and preparing for programming, spending four full days a week learning probability and programming languages from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. 'Even so, the interview process was brutal, 'Mr. Castellino said.

In November 2021, Meta offered Castellino a position as a data scientist, starting in December 2022. Last month, Meta canceled the job offer, she said.

"I worked very hard for these interviews. It feels really good to get a high-quality position," Castellino said. "I have too many expectations."

She was frustrated by the setback. "I'm sorry," Castellino said. "it's hard to hear that."

Ms. Ni sees losing her dream job as an opportunity to broaden her career horizons. In the past month, Ms. Ni has sent a lot of job applications to medium-sized technology companies and start-ups that she considers innovative, potential employers she has never considered before.

"I'm looking for opportunities that I wouldn't have considered before," Ms. Ni said. "I think I've learned a lot from it."

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