u/Silver-Air-2317

Every morning I wake up feeling ill with the state of the job market.

I graduated from my master's degree this spring. I landed three co-ops in the federal government spread across two different departments, and at this point I've got two years of experience in government.

I can speak French at a bilingual C/C/B level, and I can speak German at a high level as well. During my co-op placements, I won two separate awards from my Director General thanks to the quality of my work (in 2024 and 2025), and was nominated by my employer for Carleton's Co-op Graduate Student of the year in 2025.

Even as I was completing my master's degree, co-op placements were drying up, not just in the government, but also in the private sector. Due to budget cuts, I never landed a term or indeterminate placement, so I only have a casual contract that ends in a few weeks.

I have been applying constantly to jobs within government and in the private sector, and nothing is materializing. I've gotten interviews, and I am constantly tailoring my resume and networking as much as I can, but so far the efforts have not borne any fruit. I've landed interviews, but unfortunately did not make it past the final rounds of government competitions that I applied for.

The advice I've been given is to potentially wait out the job market by completing more education, but I would have to go to law school or do a PhD, both of which have a very high opportunity cost. I am also unable to move elsewhere to search for work, since my long term partner (who is the same age as me) has a stable job here in Ottawa. Honestly, this isn't where I thought I would be at 28 years old.

At this point I am trying to figure out a way forward. Would a CAPM certificate in project management help? Are there other certs that could be useful for landing a job in the private sector?

Right now, I know the situation is really quite bad on the job market, so I will keep harvesting as many nos as I can from potential employers. All I need is one person to take a chance on a sure thing. Unfortunately, I have not yet found that person.

TL;DR: Recent MA grad with 2 years of government experience but no term or indeterminate contract, with great references but no job lined up. Need advice.

Hi, hope this post is allowed!

I am really looking forward to Pride this year! I know it is August so our pride parade is still a few months away, but I really hope it will actually move forward this year. Quite frankly, I am still aghast that people in our own community managed to do what homophobes have wanted to do for decades, and actually manage to cancel the Pride Parade in Ottawa.

Last year, I was with my partner (who had only come out that year) and it was their first time at a pride parade. We ended up getting stuck on a bridge under the burning sun with our community group. I nearly got sunstroke, and there were loads of queer people, including vulnerable members of our community stuck out in the sun for hours since we thought it was going to move forward at any moment.

Honestly, the experience sucked.

I believe there were some Reddit threads on r/Ottawa that covered the range of opinions about the protest and whether it was endorsed by everyone stuck in the parade, so I won't get into any of that.

I'm just saying, I really want this pride parade to actually move forward, to show people that our community is capable of having a basic event without having event organizers disrupt it to the detriment of our own local LGBTQIA+ community. While protesting for the rights of all is important, our local community matters too and deserves to be celebrated.

Anyhow, happy pride month everyone!

EDIT: Damn, why am I getting absolutely slammed for this? Is it controversial to want a pride parade to actually move this year?