Everyone Around Me Is Being Fired

What do my mother, my boyfriend and my co-teaching fellow have in common?

They all lost their jobs last month.

My mom worked in banking, underwriting loans for small businesses. Her expertise and seniority earned her a top salary and position. However, when her department wasn’t generating enough revenue, she was placed on the chopping block instead of her younger and cheaper coworker. What once made her an asset suddenly became a liability.

My boyfriend was placed in his first teaching fellow (TF) position through the mystical matching of Davidson. He dove in headfirst: attending the first class and introducing himself to the ten students. As a required course in the undergraduate architecture track, enrollment above the 12-student threshold was expected. However, when administration discovered enrollment fell, one of the two TF positions had to be cut. The decision was out of his hands.

My co-teaching fellow was hired post-Davidson for a course which had grown to 14 students. Their knowledge of the course subject was beneficial and insightful during the first two classes. Then came the add/drop shuffle. When enrollment fell to 11 students, my fellow TF had to leave their position. Their employment relied on the actions of others.

These situations subvert three assumptions we tend to believe about our employment:

1. We believe being a “good employee” guarantees job security
2. We trust the hiring process protects us from instability
3. We believe we control the terms of our employment

After all, we have the power to choose to accept a job, so it feels natural to believe we also choose when to leave it. These assumptions do not hold true. And instead, everyone around me is being fired. My mother, my boyfriend, and my co-teaching fellow all accepted their positions with good faith, alongside the skill and dedication to succeed. Yet forces beyond their control—profit margins, arbitrary thresholds, enrollment numbers—were responsible for the termination of their employment. These situations reveal the somber truth: employment is not as stable as we are led to believe. But they also indicate how losing a job does not correlate to losing one’s worth. Our increased awareness of the instability of employment can serve to empower us to have the conversations to push for change.