By Elizabeth Rhoades / Staff writer

College graduates may soon find themselves not applying for white-collar professions, but instead writing an environmentally-aware resume for a green-collared job and looking for a tie that matches.

Beth Tiedemann, director of career services, said although she hasn't seen an increase in students looking for environmentally-friendly jobs, she has seen companies advertising how environmental they are as a way to draw people to their company.

Recently, at the WESTPAC job fair, the company pair Networks had a display. Their ad promotes “organic fruit with your hi-tech career”. Other companies such as Johnson and Johnson and Wal-Mart have been promoting the green aspect of their companies.

According to Careeronestop, a list that Tiedemann goes by, out of 177 fastest growing careers, almost 30 of them are environmental jobs. Web sites such as MonsterTRAK, CareerBuilder and GreenEnergyJobs have added information about green careers to their arsenal of job-hunting tools. According to MonsterTRAK, clean energy is a $55 billion per year industry. There are many careers from installing solar panels on homes, to testing water chemical levels to make it safe to drink. There are many links of helpful information on the MonsterTRAK site, along with tips on how to go about getting a green job and how to interview correctly for it.

All of the democratic presidential hopefuls have proposed their plans for creating green jobs. Finding green jobs is becoming easier and more abundant to college students. According to the US Department of Labor, environmental jobs have increased 28 percent from 2006, and are expected to increase even more in the upcoming years due to the public's interest in going green.

On the Pennsylvania Department of Conversation and Natural Resources Web site, there are a lot of jobs they are hiring for locally. If there is a particular region you would like to move to, most states now have on their Web site of environmental jobs. You can find green jobs almost anywhere now.

Tiedemann mentioned a company in the area that is very concerned with the environment. Smart Growth is a group concerned with smart development of buildings and houses in the area. This group is very local--its office is in Millstein Library.

Many things are going green now, and careers are some of the most important. With the increase in public awareness and outcry for help in the environmental field, any major is now open to get into the green-collared jobs and help the world from self-destructing.