To Sum Up

Throughout the fall semester, I have participated in an internship with Saint Joseph’s University’s Career Development Center. The Career Development Center works with both students and employers to help students get hired after graduation. Students can come into the Career Center to receive general career counseling, help with their resumes, and participate in mock interviews, among other things. The Career Center even provides help in choosing a major as well as free tests that students can take to help them find out what careers they would be interested in and enjoy doing. I was surprised to learn just how many tools the Career Development Center offers. My internship started in August and I worked with five other co-interns on both independent and group projects.

Our main purpose was to serve as liaisons between the Career Development Center and the student body. The Career Development Center is located about three blocks from the main campus and not many students know of its existence or of all the services that they offer. As students ourselves, we were better able to get in contact with other students and make known the Career Center’s existence as well as how they can help students prepare for their own career search. Every Thursday throughout the semester, my co-interns and I, along with our boss, would have a meeting to plan and discuss upcoming events, and delegate tasks.

One of my responsibilities as an intern was to attend events that were put together by the Career Development Center and help host them. The first event I attended was “Seniors…Get A Job!” It was a one hour presentation giving students a quick overview on how to use different tools to find a job, including how to navigate the Career Center’s website in order to find job postings and different job search engines. I stood at the door greeting students as they walked in and made sure they signed their name on the sign-in sheet so that my boss could keep track of attendance/ success of the event. I also helped set up the tables of food and helped to clean up when the event was over. Because I am a senior as well, I was able to get more out of the experience, and I was able to learn the different ways of finding a job along with my peers.

I also hosted an information session with Morgan Stanley. I introduced myself to the representatives and help them set up all of their technology, as well as food. And finally, I hosted the criminal justice networking night, which was one of the bigger events. I organized tables, help set up food, once again, and greeted students and employers as they walked in.

The main event of the semester was the Fall Career Fair. It was the main focus of our meetings for the first half of the internship and a lot of effort was put into the marketing of the event. We decided that the theme of the Career Fair would be Facebook, so we stuck to a blue color scheme and Facebook slang. I designed flyers to hand out to students to promote the event, and the interns collectively designed a t-shirt that we would all wear prior to and during the event. I came up with the slogan “Friend Your Future” and learned that I was pretty good at word play. We had events prior to the Career Fair solely to promote the career fair. We gave out free candy and flyers all over campus during free period. The interns split up and we stationed ourselves at all the high traffic areas reminding students about the Career Fair. We painted a bed sheet banner that we hung outside of Campion and two days before the Career Fair took place, we chalked the high traffic areas of campus with reminders that the Career Fair was taking place that week. We also participated in working the Career Fair when the day came. Some of us helped to set up in the morning and others helped to close down in the late afternoon. I greeted students and employers as they walked in. I made sure that the students signed in and that they made a nametag. I also provided students with necessary papers and gave them advice on how to approach the different employers. Overall, the event was deemed a success and the craziness of the internship died down a little bit.

Afterwards, we turned our attention to hosting events to promote the Career Development Center. Our boss gave the interns the chance to do independent project management. We were able to put together and host our own event without supervision. My co-interns and I, met outside of our weekly meetings in order to plan the event and brainstorm ideas. We decided that prize goldfish are usually very popular and to do some type of game where students could win a free goldfish. The game was simply to spin a wheel divided into different colored sections labeled “goldfish,” “Candy,” “Gift card,” and “spin again.” Whichever section the wheel landed on, that was the prize the student would receive. While they were waiting in line, they received information about the Career Development Center and the services they provide as well as a four-year plan on career development. The event was so successful that we ran out of prizes within the first hour.

The last event of the semester that we hosted was giving out free coffee in front of Campion the first week of December. Once again, we made flyers prior to the event promoting it and then handed out flyers the day of with information about the Career Development Center. The interns walked around campus handing out the informative flyers and telling students of the free coffee.

One thing that was constant throughout the entire semester was our use of social media. I and the other interns used Facebook and Twitter to promote the events and tell our peers to come to them. It was also a way of telling other SJU students about the Career Development Center and the different services they offer. To that end, all the interns kept a blog for the Career Center discussing the events and what we did as interns. To see my posts, you can visit this link: http://www.sju.edu/blogs/careers/. I talk about our different events and share my thoughts about what I learned or how they went, as well as offer some career advice to my readers.

Because my internship was with the Career Development Center, my boss wanted me to focus on my career development as well. She paired me with a mentor, who is a counselor at the Career Development Center, and I meet with her every so often to discuss my job search strategies and related topics. One thing all of the interns had to do was attend a mock interview. I did not like the idea of possibly being harshly critiqued at first, but I learned a lot from the experience. It was good practice for when I have to start going on real interviews. I now have more of an idea of what to expect and got some good pointers on conducting a good interview, as I stated in a previous blog. The other thing I was required to do was take a career test. I took the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and the Strong Interest Inventory. The tests are supposed to tell me what jobs I show the most interest in and what careers I would be happy in based on people with similar personalities to mine. The tests were very helpful in allowing me to learn about myself. I discovered that I am spontaneous and a risk taker— two things I had not known about myself before the tests—but the tests did not help me narrow down my job search at all. All of the careers that popped up were ones that I had already been considering, or considered at one point in time. The tests did not give me a specific dream job, but it did help me to realize I could be happy doing a variety of different jobs; and most of all, the tests helped me to learn about myself. After visiting with my mentor to discuss the test results, I then meant with her to discuss job search strategies. She explained to me all the different ways of finding a job: looking on-line, targeting businesses, and networking.

One of the main things I learned from this internship, both inside the Career Development Center and outside of it, isthe importance of networking. At the career panels I hosted, all the employers stressed the importance of networking and how it is the most common way people find jobs both after graduation and throughout their lives. Luckily, through my internship, I learned how to talk to employers and how to converse with almost anyone. Even handing out flyers to fellow students, required me to step out of my comfort zone a little bit because most students do not want to be bothered with the added hassle of another paper to hold on to or someone trying to sell them something. Many times, the students would just ignore me and pretend I wasn’t talking to them and I hated feeling like I was irritating them, but I learned to be more outgoing by the end of the semester.

I also learned a lot about interviewing. I was on both sides of the table with my internship. I was the one being interviewed during the mock interview where I picked up many good interviewing tips and I was later an interviewer. The Career Development Center was looking for a new director and our supervisors had narrowed down the candidates. I and another intern were asked to give him a tour of the campus and ask him some questions to see if he would be a good fit for the university. It was an interesting experience to be on the other side of the interview and it helped me gain some insight into what an interviewer considers when thinking about hiring somebody.

I learned about my own career development and what careers seem to be a good fit for me, as well as job search strategies so I can put my interviewing skills to the test.

Another major component I learned through my internship was marketing. Before my internship, I had never taken a marketing class before and did not know anything about advertising or promoting. However, I now know how to make an effective flyer and slogan, and how to use social media as a promoting tool. I also learned project management, along with my co-interns, when we put together the goldfish event on our own. I did not realize all the planning that goes into putting together and executing an event. We had to think about how to market it, who to market it to, what venue it would be held in, the time frame, etc. Along with project management, I gained experience in working with a team and learned how to compromise ideas to make them work for everyone involved.

Through this internship, I gained experience in marketing and project management, learned how to work in a team and run an event. I also learned about general career development. But most of all I learned about myself. I can now take most of what I learned and apply my newfound skills to other jobs in the future.