The Career Education and Development Center has had a dramatic increase in student appointments this semester, making them have to wait two weeks just to get an appointment, according to Director of Career Education and Development John Rindy.
Rindy said that he has been the Director of Career Education and Development for two years now and noticed a huge difference in the demand for appointments from when he first started at the university compared to this semester.
“I’ve only been here since April 2011,” Rindy said. “In 2010, we only had 50 appointments. In 2011, we had 117 appointments. Now, in 2012, we’ve had 353 appointments, having a two-week waiting period just to get an appointment. That is a significant incline.”
Rindy explained that this sudden upswing in appointments and student curiosity as to what the program can do has to do with the amount of marketing that they’ve put into the center.
“The Career Education and Development staff has brought visibility through the classroom with presentations explaining who we are and what we offer,” Rindy said. “We got to speak at WOW this year to all of the freshmen and new transfers. We’ve also had help purely through corporation with the faculty, inviting us into their classrooms. It’s just really taken off.”
Coming out of her meeting, junior therapeutic recreation major Shelby Placa said that the two-week waiting period didn’t affect her at all.
“I first came here for a mock interview assignment for my class,” Placa said. “I knew about this center before my professor told us about it, but I never really needed to use it until now. I made an appointment well in advance, so I didn’t have to be on the waiting list.”
Placa, 20, explained how the Career Education and Development Center has helped prepare her for her future.
“We mostly went over how to perfect my resume and my cover letter,” Placa said. “It made me more comfortable filling everything out and more confident when I go for job interviews. My experience overall was really great and I would recommend coming here to my friends because they definitely help you a lot.”
According to graduate assistant Sierra Williams, helping students perfect their resumes, cover letters and interviewing skills, are only a few of the many things that the Career Education and Development Center can offer.
“I meet with students daily,” Williams explained. “There are seven staff members here, including me, who help students polish their resumes and cover letters. We also prepare mock interviews for them, as well as job search strategies, how to find internships, what to wear to an interview, and major and career exploration. Anything that will help you move through college in a successful manner and help you have a good outcome is what we’re about.”
Rindy expressed similar views to Williams, saying that they can help students be more prepared to land a job after college, but they can’t just hand them jobs.
“It’s more of a teach a person to fish, rather than hand a person a fish,” Rindy said. “We do, though, have on-campus interviews and job fairs, where a lot of students end up walking away with jobs.”
Williams, 24, said feedback from students is also an important process in making the career center better.
“We’re always checking with students about their experience with us,” Williams said. “We have them fill out a survey when they leave, which asks them questions based on a one to five scale, one being the worst and five being the best. It’s a good check and balance system because it lets us know what we are excelling in, while also knowing what we need to improve on.”
Williams said that she is grateful for the sudden popularity of the center.
“It’s a really good thing to see that students are able to use our services and know that we’re there for them because that’s our purpose,” Williams said.
