A New Generation of Graduates
The Era of Full-Time Creators as Post-College Students
The future of students might look a little different to what it did 20 years ago.
With the evolution of content distribution services like YouTube, Facebook, Instagram and other selling platforms such as Etsy, Udemy and Skillshare, students have more option than ever to capitalise on their talent outside of their classes and their course.
This isn’t a new concept.
Many students have exited university being able to secure roles in very unique scenarios and there’s many wonderful stories of students becoming business leaders or creators after a few years of hard work during university or college time, but the involvement of these newer, content focused services, the access for students to express their skillset and services has grown two fold.
The Traditional Exit
Every year, college students around the globe leave the nest of their campus to pursue the jobs they have been working towards for many years.
The traditional method of leaving consists of getting a job in the city, or even a role with a top firm without a consideration for anything outside of this.
For most, this makes sense.
Security for 5+ years is great for career progression. But this factor is rapidly changing as we have started to see the evolution of content creation and niche-community celebrities emerge.
This is where the exciting potential is growing for many post-college students.
But what does the average day look like for a full-time content creator!?
Full-time Content Creators?! OR not?!
Of course, this is all risk.
Starting a content-focused business or becoming a full-time creator.
Whether they are a Snapchat creator or avid Etsy shop keeper, the road isn’t certain and it isn’t exactly rock solid. Many of the graduates that kick off their adventures on these platforms tend to run their efforts in the evenings, working a job during the day, to keep the bills paid and within 6-months decide to go full time.
This carries a lot of risk.
A regular YouTuber, Aurella creates videos on her channel Follow My French with Aurella, starting her journey in 2014 on YouTube creating a range of videos. Over time Aurella picked the topic of French language and culture to discuss and teach her growing community, in which she had learnt whilst living in Paris with her French boyfriend.
Since then, her channel has grown to over 7,500+ subscribers.
Aurella didn’t want a regular job after university. But pressures of time brought her to find an administration role.
During this time, she realised, there was potential with her YouTube channel. So she temporally focused solely on her channel.
The experience gave her so much, after 6-months of YouTube her CV now stands out from the norm and she’s been able to build a portfolio for applying to social media roles.
For me, this is a very similar story, I’m not on YouTube full-time. Although I post 3–4 videos a week, the full-time role is something that require a lot of focus and attention. Right now, I’m working freelance as my main source of income to suit my pursuit of growing on YouTube.
This a story becoming very popular with graduates that create whilst they are at university or college.
Self-Employed Graduates
The leap warrants success, but graduates today are becoming all so practical with their time. Well, some of them!
During their university course, many of them are using their free time, in which you do get a lot of on courses around the country, and using it to master the art of YouTube or content creation, even building their own communities and resources to sell with fans worldwide.
With this self-employed generation on the horizon and with so many content creators the world will be looking very different as we move into the 2020s for the world of work.
With more flexible time, more content creators and more self-employed graduates, we’ll see a huge influx in this becoming a valued tactic for students to consider once they attend their university.
How do you think it’ll all pan out?! Do you have any stories or are you a graduate making their living from content creation or sales from a platform, I’d love to hear your story in the comments.
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