Mist On One Side Light On The Other

This is an in-depth report focusing on the social phenomenon of "craze for postgraduate degree".According to official statistics,the number of applicants for graduate school nationwide has increased 2.5 times since 2016.As a hotly symptom of the times,"craze for postgraduate degree" is obviously not an isolated phenomenon,but the result of multi-level social changes.With strong social concerns,this paper takes "craze for postgraduate degree" as a point of penetration to study the Chinese society in digital transition,and presents graduate students struggle,perseverance and uncertainty through a deep description of their vividly individual stories.More deeply,it explores the deeper motives of "craze for postgraduate degree" and the deeper enlightening significance hidden under the phenomenon.This paper adopts the participatory observation and in-depth interview method of urban ethnography,interviewing more than twenty graduate students over a period of three months,and selecting representative characters from them to deeply describe their living conditions,postgraduate exam preparation experiences and sociological backgrounds.In terms of narrative technique,this paper learns from the "Wall Street Journal Style",introducing details of the characters and then switching to the social background and macroscopic thinking.It takes into account the overall and individual perspectives to the greatest extent.The text that is based on but does not stop at storytelling and observation of phenomena,strives for a reflective character in the report.Through in-depth investigation,the author finds that although there are individual reasons for candidates to choose graduate school,external factors make more profound affects,such as the imbalance between supply and demand in the job market,the prevailing "overtime culture" in Internet companies,the continuous expansion of higher education in China,and the cultural concept of "education first".In the face of the "craze for postgraduate degree ",the government and society should take advantage of the situation so that young people have richer and more diversified life choices.On the one hand,by promoting the supply-side reform of postgraduate education,the training of talents can be better adapted to the needs of economic and social changes,and on the other hand,by optimizing the employment environment and other effective measures,college students who choose to work directly without studying can also lead a decent life through hard work.