Connecticut’s new college grads contemplate uncertain economy

By Kwasi Osei-Amankwah | UConn Jour­nal­ism
May 9, 2025

Com­mence­ment sea­son is here. This week­end, UConn will see more than 5,000 under­grad­u­ates and more than 2,000 grad­u­ate stu­dents receive their degrees.

But, amid cuts to the fed­er­al gov­ern­ment and fears of a reces­sion, many have ques­tions about the econ­o­my they are head­ing into.

“It’s stress­ful,” said Ange­li­ka Gar­cia, who is about to grad­u­ate with their Bachelor’s in Music. “I want to be a music teacher, but with the gov­ern­ment cut­ting the Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion, I’m get­ting even more scared because I feel that a lot of things I want to do will like­ly get cut. And with DEI being elim­i­nat­ed as well, it feels like I won’t be able to be seen.”

In the first four months of the Trump admin­is­tra­tion, data from the White House shows mas­sive cuts to the Depart­ment of Health and Human Ser­vices, the Depart­ment of Edu­ca­tion and the Depart­ment of Vet­er­ans Affairs among oth­ers. Cuts to the Envi­ron­men­tal Pro­tec­tion Agency, as well as NIH and NSF grant mak­ing are dis­rupt­ing sci­en­tif­ic research.

Alli­son Wall is grad­u­at­ing with a BS in Nat­ur­al Resources and Envi­ron­ment. 

“I was con­sid­er­ing going for a grad­u­ate degree, but I decid­ed not to for men­tal health rea­sons,” she said. “Every­thing that’s going on with the econ­o­my and in my indus­try looks like it’s just going to be stripped and tak­en away. How could I not be stressed? You already know it’s going to be dif­fi­cult to find a job out of col­lege. Now? It feels impos­si­ble.”

By con­trast, John Limjo­co, a grad­u­at­ing eco­nom­ics major, has a sol­id plan for his post-col­lege years, with a job in finance already lined up.

“I just try to stay focused on what I can con­trol like doing good work, being curi­ous, and stay­ing flex­i­ble,” Limjo­co said. “That mind­set has helped me a lot so far, and I think it’ll keep me ground­ed going for­ward. I do think if some poli­cies keep hav­ing neg­a­tive effects on the finance indus­try, it may be a bit more dif­fi­cult to move to dif­fer­ent firms, which can be con­cern­ing look­ing down the line.”

Lisa M. Famu­la­ro, asso­ciate direc­tor at UConn’s Cen­ter for Career Readi­ness and Life Skills, said she has noticed some more con­cern among grad­u­at­ing seniors this year than in recent years, but she empha­sizes that UConn stu­dents shouldn’t fear.

“Yes, stu­dents are com­ing in and are ask­ing ques­tions about what’s hap­pen­ing to the econ­o­my and what might hap­pen to cer­tain indus­tries,” Famu­la­ro said. “If a stu­dent is not able to pur­sue their desired path, we as career coach­es teach them about trans­fer­able skills.”

Trans­fer­able skills refer to the abil­i­ty to apply the knowl­edge and expe­ri­ences gained in one field to anoth­er indus­try. Famu­la­ro encour­aged the Class of 2025 not to wor­ry too much.

“Real­is­ti­cal­ly, your first job after you grad­u­ate isn’t going to be your dream job,” she said. “Know that what­ev­er job you get, work hard in that job, and make sure you con­tin­ue to plan for the future.”

Data pro­vid­ed by Famu­la­ro shows that 92% of UConn grad­u­ates have report­ed a pos­i­tive out­come since grad­u­a­tion, includ­ing hold­ing full-time jobs, con­tin­u­ing their edu­ca­tion, or fol­low­ing oth­er pur­suits of their choos­ing with­in six months after grad­u­at­ing. Accord­ing to Famu­la­ro, the nation­al aver­age for col­lege grad­u­ates is 85%.

“It’s impos­si­ble to pre­dict the future,” Famu­la­ro said. “It’s good to be cau­tious about it, but you should nev­er give up on your dream. UConn, as an insti­tu­tion, does a good job of prepar­ing stu­dents for the job mar­ket. They have a very valu­able degree to lean back on.”