A combination of both. I apply then either rejection or silence. Those that do invite me for interviews always end up rejecting me anyway. The pattern goes like this, a recruiter calls a week or month later rejection and even in the rare cases that I do end up in the final round it yields to rejection yet again.

It would rather seem that you do not interview well.

Do you have any friends that can give you an honest answer on your attitude/demeanor that might explain this?

Do you feel you have a good, intuitive understanding of the engineering subjects you have taken, or is it mostly just being good at math and using formulas to solve engineering problems?
Generally there's a significant gap between an engineering education, and the practical application/common sense in using that knowledge, and how well you can cover that gap is often what an interviewer is looking for.
An engineering education, particularly at the BS level, consists mostly of learning the basics using mathematical analysis.
Engineering work adds a lot of synthesis.

What type of engineering work have you applied for?

 

I walked into the lobby of an HP facility in June 1976 to drop off my resume

Too many companies like HP/Agilent/Keysight hire engineers by the project so they don't really have many employees. The workers have no retirement, no health care, no vacations. We work for a "head hunting company". Generally, you only get about 50% work. But you have work and a possibility of a real job.

 

A combination of both. I apply then either rejection or silence. Those that do invite me for interviews always end up rejecting me anyway. The pattern goes like this, a recruiter calls a week or month later rejection and even in the rare cases that I do end up in the final round it yields to rejection yet again. Obviously this can't continue so what to do?

OK. My story was quite complicated. Nobody called me for an interview even months after my graduation in 2009. When interview calls and admit cards for exams of Government jobs started coming, I could not attend because I was out of the country for the cancer treatment of my mother. There were many other issues. In a society full of corruption and gender discrimination it was not easy to get a job for someone like me. However, I started contributing to a newspaper as a writer. With my money earned from writing, I did a certificate course at the Engineers Institute. I completed a long course (3 months, with certification) on AVR microcontroller. Eventually that gave me a start and progress in embedded systems engineering. Many of my friends took other courses at the same institute. Some took PLC programming and got jobs in power and automaton sector. Some took Autocad 2D and 3D courses and joined substation equipment manufacturing companies.

If you have not done any course after your graduation yet, you can join some courses depending on market demand. I believe that will help you secure a suitable position. All the best.