MONTEGO BAY, St James — The uncertainty of life after graduating from university has oftentimes caused grave stress and anxiety on final-year students.

Now, with the onset of the novel coronavirus pandemic, many tertiary students in western Jamaica have reported added pressure as they attempt to stay afloat during the most challenging year they have faced thus far, while remaining hopeful about life after graduation.

Fredricka Johnson, fourth-year business administration student at the University of the Technology (UTech) Western Jamaica Campus explained that job uncertainty is a major concern shared among her and colleagues as graduation nears.

Johnson, whose major is finance, argued that lack of job experience and networking due to the pandemic could result in finance students becoming unemployed after completing their degrees.

She also pointed out that there will be a high level of competition to land such jobs.

“It [will] be very hard for me and my colleagues to get jobs when we are finished with school. A lot of financial institutions laid off employees due to the [pandemic] and as final-year students most of us don’t have any job experience so there will [be] a high level of competition going into the working environment,” she lamented.

“Also, most of these institutions hire based on networking, so if it is a case where you do not have enough networking background or you don’t know somebody in that particular organisation, then it is very hard for you to get a job in [that] organisation.”

The University of the West Indies, Mona, Western Jamaica Campus student Enrieka Blagrove, who is pursuing a Bachelor of Science Degree in Accounting and Management Studies, while sharing similar sentiments, stressing that the current job market is a major concern.

“The pandemic has shown us that nothing is really set in stone and we don’t know what tomorrow may bring,” he said.

He also expressed concerns over the possibility that the pandemic could escalate and the current digital divide which affects a large percentage of tertiary level students.

“The digital divide is affecting several students islandwide and [some] persons are not able to continue their education because of the pandemic and their inability to cover the expenses that comes with it, seeing that the unemployment rate continues to go up while the standard of living of many Jamaicans deteriorates,” he argued.

Challenges with the online platform, such as connectivity issues, have not been mentally pleasing on many final year students.

“It has been very challenging. Staying home and not being able to interact with the lecturer has resulted in a lot not being able to get transferred and presentations have gotten more challenging because of Internet connectivity issues,” Blagrove told the Observer West.

“Recently, we did a class presentation and because of numerous persons having technical challenges with [their] Internet, it took a longer time for them to deliver their sections and complete the presentation. Persons had to be disconnecting and reconnecting multiple times throughout the presentation which diminished the overall quality of most of the presentations.”

Kaysha Channer, a student at the Sam Sharpe Teachers’ College in Montego Bay, expressed concern to the Observer West about the quality of teachers graduating from the various teachers’ colleges and entering the education sector.

“I am concerned, not for me, but for the students who are in early childhood through secondary institutions. I am worried about the quality [of] teachers who will be going out there. Quality teachers in terms of, yes, we can learn [how] to navigate the online platform, but will we be able to handle the face-to-face interactions with the kids, after they are reintroduced into the face-to-face [education] system?” she questioned.

“I am very concerned about the teachers who will be leaving college, are we ready for it? Even though I am at the tertiary level, we have lecturers who do not come to classes just the same. I am really concerned about the performance of the teachers going out there and how the students will react when they are reintegrated into the system.”