: Hi everyone, I am a 36F international student currently in the US, facing a major career bottleneck due to the brutal tech job market and visa constraints. I would love some objective advice on which path offers the highest certainty for long-term stability and permanent legal status in the US. My Background: • Education: B.A. and M.A. in Literature and a recent Master’s in ordinary univeristyin Computer Science (US). • Experience: 7 years of classroom teaching experience in China.

Locally, I recently completed a brief summer internship/research assistantship doing AI Lab Job and Froniter Research.

Looking for advice on these three options:

• Option 1: The PhD Path. Commit to a 5-year CS/AI program. Like frontier skill. Risk: Graduate at 41 with low stipend.
• Option 2: Teach at education company :Use my 7-year teaching background for university/non-profit roles to secure a cap-exempt H-1B first. Risk: Trapped in teaching/service roles that I strongly dislike.
• Option 3: SDE tech:I got no response i need sponsor and change my career maybe.

I was talking to a friend from a huge pharma agency to recommend an account manager who might be open to work. He’s said it’s really bad. He has requests still pending since June at his company not filled yet and his network uses 900+ freelancers.

I’m not sure what’s going on. Are there shortages of healthcare/pharma account executives out there? At the current state I would think it’s hirer’s market but is that not so in this sector?

Basically, in the onboarding email for the position, I was told the company (HireRight) would send me instructions to fill out a few electronic forms and get my background check completed within 3-5 business days. I filled out these forms day of, but the next day, I also got a request to physically mail them my fingerprints since my previous jobs were out of state. They also asked for ink (who does ink??) or a printed digital card from a third party, attached to the card that they emailed me. It took me way too long to even get this done, and I have no idea when HireRight will receive it. Since I'm an idiot and this is my first background check, I didn't know this could delay everything. I thought I was fine because the onboarding email didn't mention fingerprints so I didn't notify anyone about it. I'm not supposed to start until January but I'm still really scared I screwed myself.

We are cooked gang. Blue and white collars aren't safe.

I was emailed a soft offer by the person in charge of onboarding at the company I've been interviewing with. I was told that they would be sending my actual offer documentation yesterday, "later on in the day" (Friday), but I never received anything.

This is a startup company, and they do not have an HR department, so the CFO is the one doing the offer letters and the onboarding/sending the PEO links. Should I be concerned, or is it possible that he just had entirely too much on his plate and wasn't able to get to creating/finishing the offer?

Keep in mind, when I was interviewed for my first round (Oct 5th), I didn't hear back about my invite for my second round until 11pm on Oct. 11th. My recruiter who got me connected with the company in the first place told me that I should expect the official offer letter sometime this weekend or by Monday morning. She also said that for the last person she got hired at this job that she called their references for them, but she told me she wasn't able to get around to it and that she would have to call mine this upcoming Monday/Tuesday. So I am also trying to consider if that is also what is delaying the official offer letter being sent to me.

I am in a very tight window financially, due to months of unemployment and living off my savings and I am at the very end of my savings at this point. If I don't start this job within the next 3 weeks, I'm screwed.

I know a lot of folks with degrees (myself included) struggle to get jobs… but we’re in a teacher shortage and lots of schools are doing incentives to hire people with degrees and fast tracking certification. Why aren’t more people working in schools ?

This one surprised me. A company sought me out because of my experience and education in the AML and fraud space, which was exciting because the requisition wasn’t even open yet. Someone asked for my resume and forwarded it to HR. Within 13 minutes, HR emailed me asking to schedule an interview. They said they weren’t sure how soon the requisition would open but they definitely wanted me to meet with the VP. They scheduled that conversation, it turned out they were opening a role and the interview went well. Afterward HR let me know I was moving forward to the assignment round.

I started working on the assignment and asked a clarifying question about the data. It turned out they wanted me to evaluate everything as of April rather than the current date, which changed my approach enough that I needed to restart. There wasn’t a deadline but I still let them know I would need one additional day. Instead of submitting it the next day, I submitted it the following day. I also had a few people review my work to see whether my reasoning and conclusions made sense to them before turning it in.

Then late on a Saturday, I received an automated rejection. That was the entire follow-up after a company had proactively sought me out, quickly arranged an interview with its VP and asked me to complete an assignment. I have substantial experience with the work the assignment covered, completed it quickly even with the clarification and have done roughly 25 interview assignments over the last two years. Until this one I had never been rejected immediately after the assignment round.

I’m not saying that means my work couldn’t have missed the mark or that I was entitled to move forward. But the sequence feels strange, and I’m left wondering what happened. Did the assignment change their assessment? Had they already decided against moving forward while I was still working on it? Did something change internally? I don’t know, and an automated rejection gives me nothing to work with. Going from being actively recruited before a role was even open to receiving a Saturday rejection after completing their assignment feels like a pretty abrupt shift. This one honestly feels fishy, even though I don’t have enough information to say why.

I'm 27k in student loan debt, homeless, have no job, no savings, two SWE internships on my resume, projects, and a useless cs bachelor's degree from 2025.

Given how much I have on my resume, and that not being enough for initial entry level interviews... I don't see why I should be going back.

Internships are only becoming more difficult to get as time passes, and what would I even go back for? Just "learn a trade" only for that to be oversaturated by the end?

Even if I still had a roof over my head with more forgiving parents, I'm not sure if I'd be willing to go back. I just don't see what the fuck more I could do. Working deadend minimum wage jobs only gets so far. It's not enough for a roof.

I'm not looking to be making fucking six figures straight out of college. I was desperate to even make 50k a year. It's 2026. That should not be so difficult to obtain.

This world doesn't feel worth living in.

Hi all! I’ve been so nervous since my interview because this is my dream company, and honestly, just getting the opportunity to interview felt like a big deal to me.
I prepared my ass off, and I felt like 3 out of the 4 interviews went pretty well.

My recruiter said I should hear back by Thursday or Friday, but I haven’t heard anything from them since. I had also emailed the hiring manager after the interview, and although it took a while, they surprisingly replied on Friday with this message:

“Hello Again! Appreciate this note and thank you very much for your interest in the role and for participating. We just met to review the panel feedback after additional interviews yesterday. I will keep you posted, but I’ve heard good things, and we may have you try for one of my other open roles. Stay tuned and have a great weekend!”

I know this sounds somewhat positive, but my anxious brain is reading between the lines and telling me they’ve probably selected someone else for the role I interviewed for, and they might consider me for another position if they don’t find someone else.

I honestly don’t know how to interpret this. Does “I’ve heard good things” mean I’m still in the running, or does mentioning other open roles usually mean they’re leaning toward another candidate for this one?

I know nobody can know for sure, but I’d really appreciate some perspective from anyone who’s been in a similar situation. The waiting and overthinking are killing me! 😭

Looking for advice on handling an employment history question on a HireRight background check.

I worked in a university research lab for about two years and listed it as a single entry on my resume covering that full span. The reality is more layered:

• First ~10 months(2 semesters): Informal involvement as a student, no appointment, no pay. I was around the lab working with my professor, and did an independent study course with him for one semester as well .
• Next ~12 months: Formal volunteer appointment (I have a department letter covering these exact dates).
• Within that year: Two separate paid spells as a Research Assistant (on payroll, verifiable through the university payroll system).

My plan for the HireRight form is three entries matching the documents exactly: the volunteer appointment plus the two paid spells. Everything ties to a verifying document.

Two questions:

1. Is there a better way to structure this overall on the HireRight form?
2. Mainly: what do I do about the informal ~10 months at the start? Should it be its own entry even though there's no HR or payroll record? I'm worried an entry HireRight can't verify comes back "unable to verify" and looks worse than leaving it off, but I'm also worried the resume showing an earlier start date than the form looks like a discrepancy.

Has anyone dealt with something like this? Did explaining it proactively to the hiring manager help?

Thanks!

Got another rejection today (and to top it off I already knew the team I would have been working with and had worked with them before). Been searching for jobs since I graduated in May this year with zero bites. I’m in a position where I’m either over or under-qualified for everything and because I have no choice but to list my master’s degree on my resume since my past three years of work experience is directly tied to having been a grad student I feel like its barring me from consideration for any of the barista-type jobs I’ve applied for because I’d be seen as a flight risk. What do I do??? Am I screwed?? Is anyone else with an advanced degree feeling this way?? :(

sent from Jerkday at 3 in the morning as part of a "daily update" that I didn't ask for. When I click the unsubscribe link I'm prompted for a Microsoft account? Yeah, no.

Has anyone gotten a job contact through an initial Jerkday application? Anyone? Bueller?

I follow these formatting rules with my resume:

- Avoid 2-column layouts
- Don’t use tables for layout
- Keep contact info in the main body
- Use standard bullets (• or -)
- Use simple indentation
- Use consistent date format
- Don’t put important text in images/icons
- Make sure the PDF has a real text layer (copy/paste into Notepad should read cleanly)
- Use standard section headings

I have a truly plain-Jane, simple AF resume. Despite this, I still get weird line breaks when I upload my resume into Workday specifically.

Anything I’m missing? Is it a line spacing issue? Should I stop using bullets altogether?

Hi all,

My 15-yo boy wants to get a part-time job outside high school hours. He's applied to the fast food chains but have got no response. Any suggestions on how to land a part-time gig at this age?

Thanks in advance.

Hi all,

I received an offer from my #1 company and they are doing a background check through TrueScreen. They ask for the basic information but the only thing I have concerns about is the employment portion.

I didn't lie about my employment or titles but when filling out the employment portion of the form, it asks for managers, titles, and phone numbers.

Does this mean TrueScreen will call my past managers to ask about performance, character, etc.?

I'm nervous because one of the managers I listed, we butted heads quite a bit and he didn't like me, so I'm worried he will have bad things to say.

However, I went through a background check two weeks ago through FirstAdvantage and passed so.

Thanks for the help.

Some of the assessment questions were weird, for example:

Do you work too fast without thinking about safety more, or do you miss deadlines more? WHAAAAAAAAT. I DONT DO EITHER.

If Domino's Pizza can have an online pizza tracker to tell you where your pizza is, I feel like companies should be able to do something similar.

I see so many posts talking about being ghosted, and I have experienced the same myself. Why can't companies help put people out of their misery and say "Sorry, no job for you. But here's a coupon for some pizza."

That way there are (hopefully) no awkward emails, no waiting endlessly. Just the facts.

I am considering taking the SIE to maybe help me get a job in finance? Also considering take the Wall Street prep financial modeling course. Do you think this will help me land an offer or it won’t matter?

Hey everyone, navigating through this hell hole of unemployment and i’m experiencing everything y’all are describing (so much fun).

Something new is happening however…

I am no longer getting rejection emails - say I applied to about 30 jobs this week and last week and no response whatsoever to any of them.

Does it mean they’re that backed up they can’t even reject anymore?

Ive applied to remote (high applications) but also local jobs (“less than 10 applicants”)

*i do receive “thank you for applying […] your application has been submitted” email