As a first-generation student, uncertainty has been a constant companion throughout graduate school. I learned early how to read failure as a sign that I didn’t belong, a habit that the academic job market has a way of reactivating. As I reach the end of my doctoral journey, I am finishing up my research, writing up my dissertation, and trying to land my dream job, all while life keeps happening and the world feels heavy. Navigating all of this at the same time is incredibly difficult.
The waiting
During the end of 2025, I spent countless hours curating application materials meant to perfectly encapsulate five to six years of work, which felt nearly impossible. I began submitting these applications with genuine optimism, trusting that hiring committees would be able to see both my preparation and how much I wanted to contribute to their departments. I put my best foot forward and that was all I could really do, the rest was in the hands of the committees. I can honestly say I felt confident as I hit the “submit” button on over one hundred applications, even though my confidence in the mathematical space has always been a struggle for me. Then the waiting began. The constant refreshing of my email consumed my thoughts. I wish I were exaggerating: I checked my inbox every couple of minutes, usually to find nothing had changed. It quickly became unhealthy. At a certain point, the refresh actually introduced new messages from the schools I applied to and my stomach would drop each time. Would it be a rejection? Would it be an interview invitation? Would it be an offer? It astonishes me how much of a physical and emotional reaction these emails provoked in me.
What the market does to your confidence
There were many rejections, coupled with interview invitations that arrived just often enough to keep me off balance. My confidence swung wildly from one extreme to the other, and I struggled to keep up with it, giving me extreme whiplash. One moment I was reassured by the fact that a committee saw something in me and the next, I was questioning everything about myself. From the beginning of my graduate career, I felt as though I was behind at every step. Somehow everyone around me had the secret recipe on how to believe in themselves and move through academia with ease. Whether that confidence was real or carefully performed, it took me years to build my own. The rejections still sting, but what surprised me most was the particular ache of interviews: the tension between they liked me enough to interview me and not enough to hire me, and the way that space can quietly erode confidence if you let it.
Staying human in the process
The job market doesn’t just evaluate our CVs, research statements, and teaching statements, it quietly invites us to re-evaluate ourselves. There is a delicate balance between allowing disappointment and refusing self-erasure. For many first-generation scholars, disappointment can feel especially heavy, because it often taps into an old fear: that we were never supposed to make it this far in the first place. Rejections don’t just say “no” to a job, they can threaten to erase years of persistence, sacrifice, and quiet courage. Allowing ourselves to feel that disappointment, without letting it rewrite our sense of worth, is a skill most of us are still learning. In those moments, community becomes essential: mentors who remind us of our growth, friends who sit with us in the uncertainty, and peers who understand the strange mixture of pride and grief that comes with this stage of the job market. And even with all of that, there are days when the only meaningful act is continuing anyway, especially with the current state of the country, showing up because persistence itself becomes a form of care and belief in a future we cannot yet see. Choosing ourselves again and again is the most honest Valentine we can give.
Jasmine Camero is finishing up her Ph.D. in arithmetic geometry under the supervision of Bianca Viray. Her mission is to build an equitable and inclusive community and cultivate environments that amplify the voices of people of color in STEM.