Faculty Resources
Faculty Best Practices in Career Development
Jim Anderson from Applied Plant Science created a career related assignment for students in his orientation course. The assignment required students to visit the St. Paul Campus Career Center web site, identify 10 potential employers in their field, list 3 steps to finding a job, activate their GoldPASS account, search for an internship or position and describe the position as well as how to apply. Additionally, students were asked to bring a copy of their resume to class for the presentation on effective resumes. Now applying for a job in their field is not so intimidating! Jim's assignment helped students not only prepare for a career search or a career fair but to get the most out of the experience. The students felt more confident in their job search abilities and the potential employers were impressed with their motivation.
Last spring, the staff at the Food Industry Center worked with the St. Paul Campus Career Center to develop a resume book that contained the resumes of students interested in food industry jobs and internships. The St. Paul Campus Career Center marketed the opportunity to students, helped students spruce up their resumes through resume critiques, and bound the resumes into a book which was given to over 20 members of the Food Industry Council Program Leadership Board at their spring meeting. This project was an innovative way to help make connections between employers and students.
Faculty in Applied Economics as well as Food Science and Nutrition were finding that the material covered in their freshman orientation course was not a good fit for many of the transfer students taking the class. These departments have worked with the St. Paul Campus Career Center to have their transfer students take our Strategic Career Planning Course (CFAN 4201) as a substitute for the orientation course. The results of this adjustment have been very positive. Students rate the course highly and find it is very relevant to their needs as transfer students who are often read to search for internships and jobs.
William Goodman, faculty in Family Social Science, has taken steps over the past semester to utilize InterNetwork to the fullest. William requires his Preparation for Working with Families class to research internships through InterNetwork, and also requires his internship class to post their experiences and feedback for their classmates’ benefit, making his students the greatest beneficiaries of all this resource has to offer. Approximately 33% of the entries in InterNetwork are Family Social Science-related. Wouldn’t your internship-seekers benefit by hearing from their classmates? Offering extra credit for posting internships is another strategy for encouraging use. Just refer students to InterNetwork, http://www.stpaulcareers.umn.edu/internship_experience/internetwork.html