I have just read and re-read the article in this week’s Building magazine outlining the bleak situation that graduates are finding themselves in. It has left me feeling numb and disheartened by the current job market

I am due to graduate this time next year with a BSc in building surveying and I and my peers are painfully aware that we are likely to join the unemployed, with the few valuable graduate positions available subject to preposterous competition.

Being terrified is not an overstatement at how I feel at the prospect of no job at the end of my studies. Not because I feel entitled to a job, but because I feel I have a lot to give and have worked incredibly hard to achieve my goal; I am not too keen to see my aspirations crumble in a career that I love.

I would simply ask employers to try and look to the future and not dismiss graduates as a dispensable commodity when times get tough. People like myself can inject greatly needed passion, knowledge and insight into the industry, and it would be tragic for this to be lost, both on a personal level and for the UK construction industry.

Laura Hamer

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