Fewer college grads have jobs than at any other time in recent memory—a report by the National Association

of Colleges and Employers annual student survey said that 20 percent of

2009 college graduates who applied for a job actually have one. So, what should the unfortunate 80% do?

How about a post-graduate year doing some combination of the following (not just one, how about all):

Spend twenty hours a week running a project for a non-profit.

Teach yourself Java, HTML, Flash, PHP and SQL. Not a little, but mastery. [Clarification: I know you can't become a master programmer of all these in a year. I used the word mastery to distinguish it from 'familiarity' which is what you get from one of those Dummies type books. I would hope you could write code that solves problems, works and is reasonably clear, not that you can program well enough to work for Joel Spolsky. Sorry if I ruffled feathers.]

Volunteer to coach or assistant coach a kids sports team.

Start, run and grow an online community.

Give a speech a week to local organizations.

Write a regular newsletter or blog about an industry you care about.

Learn a foreign language fluently.

Write three detailed business plans for projects in the industry you care about.

Self-publish a book.

Run a marathon.

Beats law school.

If you wake up every morning at 6, give up TV and treat this list like a job, you'll have no trouble accomplishing everything on it. Everything! When you do, what happens to your job prospects?