Priority registration is right around the corner; correspondingly, full-blown anxiety attacks are too. Student advising appointments are only a subtle reminder of our few remaining semesters on campus. In the present times of such economic struggle, the stress of the uncertain future is much stronger in students than October midterm anxiety.

Results from a 2011 CollegeGrad.com survey show that your major or degree is the most important factor involved in post-graduation hiring. Additionally, grade point average plays only a 3 percent role in hiring decisions. The survey states that your major plays a 34 percent role in your likelihood of hire, while internships are at 24 percent and your communication skills are next in line. Looking at the facts, it is hard to determine whether we are wasting time in the library raising those daunting GPAs or if we screwed up by picking a major that actually meets our interests.

Fear not though, there’s hope on the horizon for most of you even in trying times.

The students who chose majors such as business administration, information systems or finance will be the ones hired into full-time jobs that will bore them to death with number crunching. However, there are some ways that other students can get creative after graduation with less limiting degrees.

Some majors, like elementary education and pre-medicine, have internship requirements for graduation. Required or not, internships are nothing but beneficial to any college student. Before or after graduating, internships go hand-in-hand with a part-time job at Starbucks, or any other type of waged position.

For the students that chose majors with less promising entry-level jobs, there are many unopened doors in the job-market corridor. The top employer of entry-level grads in 2011 is Enterprise Rent-A-Car. Ever thought of a position in car rental? If it pays the bills with full-time hours, taking a job that has no correlation with a college major might actually be a wise choice considering the rough economic times.

Then there’s always continuing your education. Graduate school, although expensive, guarantees at least an extra nine months of academic shelter. Although rumors are circulating that graduate school students have no greater financial promises than undergraduates, it is a more comfortable future than moving back into the old room at Mom and Dad’s house.

Ultimately though, the 2011 survey results are not meant to make students regret studying interesting majors or shatter their dreams of exciting careers. It is more of a reality check.

It is fair to assume that not every student has their future mapped out, much less an actual game plan.

Sitting in the advising offices hearing that you only 15 units to graduate is possibly the most fearful, and at the same time relieving, situation to a UA upperclassmen. However, the anxiety does not accomplish anything and only leaves students pondering their direction in life in a library study room. When overwhelming thoughts of the future begin to fill up your brain capacity otherwise reserved for midterm study guides, remember that the professionals at CollegeGrad.com say it’s not necessarily how high your grades were, but what you studied and how you applied it.

— Caroline Nachazel is a junior studying jounalism and communication. She can be reached at letters@wildcat.arizona.edu.