大学生面临毕业即失业

22-year-old Cara Hessels is gunning for a career in media in the Big Apple.

This is what I have been working for for four years now, so I want this job more than anything.

Graduation is less than a week away, but instead of focusing on the cap and gown, it's all about landing the job. Today is Cara's tenth job interview. This one, at a major fashion magazine. And 40 minutes later, it's over.

They did tell me that they think I'm great, so I don't know what than means for my chances, but at least I know that they liked me.

But being liked doesn't mean getting hired.

At this time, roughly about a quarter of the graduates have offers in hand, compared to in 2007, a much better job market when 50 percent of the seniors had, had their jobs in hand.

The outlook is getting better though. Companies are expected to hire 5.3 percent more new college grads this year than last. But still, unemployment for 20- to 24-year-olds, it's around 17 percent. That's more than double what it was in 2007 and far higher than the national average.

The majority of my friends are on the same boat as me. Those that do have jobs are very far and few between. I have just leased this new apartment, so I need to figure out a way to be able to pay for it within a month.

And adding to the stress, this year's graduating class is not only competing with their peers, they're also competing with 09 grads still searching for work. So what's a grad to do?

It is still incredibly competitive. It still is going to require them to do a lot of research to find out who's got the jobs, where are they, and how did they make the connections that they can to reach those jobs.

Cara says she is doing all of that and more. And even with a college degree, she may take a nanny job this summer just to pay the rent.

For those of my friends that have graduated, just say, like, welcome to unemployment, like, this is how it is. It's, it's... You know, nobody ever thought that they would actually be graduating without a job.

It's a scary reality facing hundreds of thousands of young adults graduating from college right now.

In New York, Poppy Harlow, cnnMoney.