Liberal Arts Voices

Read the perspectives of our current students

My Internship at a Sports Agency

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Mural in Octagon lobby by LAUSatPSU
Mural in Octagon lobby, a photo by LAUSatPSU on Flickr.

After sitting here for five minutes contemplating a witty way to introduce myself, I’ve sadly decided to resort to a typical introduction. Now that the ice has been broken, hello, my name is Stuart Yacobian, and I’m a rising senior majoring in economics and spending my summer interning in the sports industry. 

I’ll be here all summer chronicling my job and discussing different aspects of the industry and my position, and I look forward to sharing my experiences with everyone. 
This summer, I’m extremely fortunate to be working at a sports agency called Octagon, one of the world’s biggest sports representation and management firms. With clients ranging from Michael Phelps to Justin Tuck to Steph Curry, there’s never a shortage of things to do. 
Generally, spending a summer in an expensive city like D.C. and working an unpaid internship 40 hours a week would be taxing, but it’s a dream come true for someone like me who is determined to work in this industry.
Octagon is a unique company in that it’s a full-service sports agency. What that means is that clients have the option of using Octagon for not only representation, but also for their marketing, public relations, and financial services.
As a result, some clients end up having Octagon pay their monthly water and electricity bills, as well as managing commercial appearances and the media. 
This leads to a large company composed of multiple departments and A LOT of specialty. The company is also involved with the client management of non-athletes as well, with such people like Arsenio Hall and Piers Morgan.
In fact, Octagon has offices in 18 countries and more than 1,000 employees.
Now that I’ve had my fair share of rambling, you may be asking yourself (or not): what makes Octagon unique? Well, for the most part, agencies are limited to merely the representation aspect of the business, and they tend not to get involved in marketing and PR of an athlete. 
That’s not to say that other companies don’t do the same, (IMG comes to mind as one), but generally that is not the case.  LeBron James, for example, is represented by CAA, but  he employs Fenway Sports Management to manage his marketing. 
I’m spending my 10 weeks at Octagon working in the Public Relations department. You might be thinking that with so many clients, public relations would be an extremely busy job. If so, then you are absolutely right.
Something I’ve quickly come to realize in this industry is that the word “routine” does not exist. Not only is every day completely different, but every hour is completely different. 
I find myself doing typical PR activities, such as writing press releases when we sign a new client or booking flights for an NBA player going to make a marketing appearance.
The unpredictable and fast-paced nature of the industry has me loving every moment of my internship, and it has only further validated my desire to work in the field, whether with Octagon or another company.
Two weeks from now, I’ll be back for more blogging fun–this time discussing the difficulty of breaking into the industry and the importance of networking.
Stay classy! 

Career Resources for Liberal Arts Students

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PSU students often hear about how lucky they are to be members of the Penn State network.  But actually understanding how to navigate that network and make important connections is often quite another story.  Penn State Live recently posted an article focusing on several resources and networking opportunities available to all Penn State students, and we want to make sure Liberal Arts majors are aware of a new resource: the Career Enrichment Network (CEN), which focuses on assisting CLA majors with their specific career-related needs.  From the centralized Penn State Career Services office to the College-based CEN to your fellow students, using the resources available to you can help you make the connections that will move you along on your chosen career path.

The Career Enrichment Network officially opened during the fall 2011 semester and soon after launched the web-based Network Symplicity system for students to post resumes, search for internships, and keep track of various career events.  I wrote about some of the services Liberal Arts majors can expect from the CEN in a blog post last December, and since that time, our resources have continued to expand.
 
During the spring semester, we had four undergraduate Network Assistants working with us.  They blogged about various events, services, and opportunities (you can read some of their past blog posts here and here and here).  We hosted a Networking 101 session to kick off the semester, and attendees had a number of department- and College-related opportunities to use their newly polished networking skills throughout the semester, culminating in a very successful Alumni Networking Event.
 
Students have been using Network Symplicity to search, apply for, and secure internship opportunities. Communication Arts & Sciences major Sadie Buckallew wrote about her summer internship with the Penn State Press earlier this week.  Numerous other liberal arts majors will be blogging about their various enrichment activities throughout the summer. Be sure to watch for new postings that may give you some ideas for experiences you will want to apply for in the future!

Starting this fall, we will be offering a new program, LEAD (Leadership Enrichment through Assessment and Development), in cooperation with faculty and students from the Department of Psychology.  This program, available exclusively to Liberal Arts majors, will provide participants with the opportunity to complete a range of on-line assessments, conduct an in-person interview with one of the program researchers, and as an outcome, receive feedback on strengths to highlight to potential employers, as well as information on areas in which they need to develop their skills, so they can address those needs prior to graduation.  Keep an eye out here on the LAUS Blog, in the LAUS Announcements, and via your Network Symplicity accounts for information on how to register with LEAD.

I said it in my post back in December, but I think it bears repeating – I don’t think there has ever been a better time to be a Liberal Arts student at Penn State, especially in terms of the staff and resources available to help you as you explore the many career fields and options available to Liberal Arts graduates.  Be sure to take advantage of ALL of the resources available to you – through the Network, through Career Services, through your academic department, and through the connections you’ve made or are making at your internships, study abroad programs, undergraduate research assignments, and extracurricular activities.  Building your network, talking with people, and exploring your options will all help you to find the career path you want to pursue.

Susan Knell is the Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Director and can be reached via email at lanetwork@la.psu.edu or by phone at 814-865-1070.

My Internship at Penn State University Press: An Introduction

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books460.jpgMy name is Sadie Buckallew, and this summer (through next May!) I am lucky enough to have a marketing internship with the Penn State University Press, PSU’s non-profit publishing house. This is a little bit about how I got this opportunity.

 

Last December, I started panicking about my future.  I thought I wanted to go into publishing after graduation, and I knew for sure that I needed an internship to do it. I figured I needed an internship to do anything. I was a Junior CAS student in a scary place, so I took advantage of the on-campus career services that I thought could help. I met with my advisor, Mary Cameron, with Peter Miraldi and Liz Jenkins, two of the school’s internship coordinators, and with a career services advisor, Elif Balin.  Together, they helped me sort myself out and get situated in an advantageous position. More than anything, they all gave me peace of mind and encouraged me to apply to everything that piqued my interest. I stopped panicking. I could do this achievement thing right after all.

 

Through my advisors, I was directed to the Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Network Symplicity system, and I found out about my internship through the site. I worked out the kinks in my resume (with the help of several friends and family members, even), completed the application, and had an interview a week later. I actually applied to several opportunities during the course of my summer internship search, but the position at the Press was the one most aligned with my dreams and my living arrangements. I actually learned that I got the internship during the interview – I couldn’t believe it. I felt like the luckiest student in the world.

 

I know that my experience with The Great Internship Scramble isn’t typical; it’s unlikely for a student to land a position so ideal so quickly. To be perfectly honest, I still reel a little when I look back on it. I put myself out there and kept at it until I got what I was working towards. In the end, everything just sort of… came together. I don’t think I would have done so well without the confidence I received from everyone I spoke to throughout the process. I’m very lucky to be where I am right now, and it’s only getting better.

Keep an eye out for more posts about my internship experience at Penn State University Press.

How Career Services Can Help You: The Basics

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A few weeks ago, the Career Enrichment Network’s Network Assistants had the opportunity to head over to Career Services to learn more about what Liberal Arts students can find there in terms of general opportunities to begin their internship or job application process. This not only reminded me of my fond memories of East Halls and the trek up Bigler Road…but also that the advisers there actually won’t bite your head off the minute you walk into the doors! I promise you don’t have to know what business professional means or how to find the Nittany Lion Career Network (the what?) before you go. That is why the center is fully staffed with knowledgeable and encouraging counselors: to help you understand any questions like, “What do I want to do with my life?” or “How can my major be used to find an actual job?”. I am here to explain a quick overview of what is offered at Career Services and how you can use the center to your benefit – without being too nervous to step foot inside.

A first time visitor myself, I had a vague impression of how advisers could exactly help students with at the center. We spoke with Bob Orndorff, Associate Director of Employer Relations and Counseling, and he broke it down very simply for us as to how students can approach the services offered:

Drop-In Counseling: This is a fifteen minute time slot that you do not need an appointment for. Anyone can come in for resume reviews, interview critiques, or quick questions concerning any basic application information. Perhaps this is your first time at Career Services and you would just like someone to explain to you what the difference is between business casual and business professional in terms of attire or how to frame your cover letter. Hours for drop-in counseling are 8:30am-5:00pm Monday through Friday, except on Tuesdays when the hours extend until 7:00pm. One important thing to note is that you must attend one drop-in counseling appointment before making a career counseling appointment.

Career Counseling: This more private form of counseling is available for one hour time slots for students that need a more focused and consistent approach for their career-related questions. This type of appointment would be ideal for students who are facing some out-of-school issues that are affecting their academic- and career-related goals and for those who need some personalized attention, perhaps even longer-term counseling. This is also ideal for students who are completely lost with where to begin in terms of using the programs provided by Career Services or for those who have no idea what their future goals might be. Usually when a student goes for career counseling, they will return for a series of multiple sessions with the same counselor as to progress through whatever problems they are encountering. Hours for career counseling are the same as the drop-in sessions.

Group Career Counseling: Group sessions are designed for students who wish to approach their career-related goals in a less individualistic setting. They would occur at a certain time every week and are available upon request. This form of counseling is ideal for international students, who might be less apt to approaching an adviser during a one-on-one meeting.

In addition to coming to the Career Services building, students can find information on the Penn State Career Services website that can help narrow down their search for internship and job positions. One section is the Nittany Lion Career Network, where students can connect with employers and research when companies are coming to Penn State for on-campus interviews. Two others are WetFeet and Vault, where students can search company profiles and employer guides and also find interview and resume tips. Click on this PDF for more information and links regarding these two sites. A final resource is Lionlink, a source that helps current students get in touch with alumni who volunteer as “Career Coaches” in specific fields of interest.

With three different kinds of counseling and multiple resources to help you with any aspect of the job search, Career Services doesn’t sound so bad, does it? Whereas some students may be hesitant to head on over, now you know the basic information to get you started. When in doubt, you can browse their website to get a feel for more information or even just pick up the phone and call and ask (814-865-2377).

As a fellow student looking for internships and job posting myself, I can advise that my few experiences with Career Services have been nothing but positive, and I felt that everyone working there simply just wants to help. So make the trek back to the east side of campus, forget all past doubts, and take a few simple steps to kick start your career search process – you will be proud that you did.

Interning at Penn State’s Justice and Safety Institute (JASI)

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After abandoning my original plan of graduating in three and a half years in favor of taking the final course I needed to earn a Business and the Liberal Arts minor, I knew I wanted to supplement my semester with an internship. It seemed to be the perfect time as I only planned to take an accounting course and two electives. Little did I know how useful a smaller course load would be for the internship I ended up in.

I browsed around the PSU Liberal Arts site for local internships and came across an available internship at the Law Enforcement Branch at the Penn State Justice and Safety Institute (JASI) right here on campus at Innovation Park. Coming from a military and law enforcement family, I was immediately intrigued, so I browsed the website. I was really encouraged and impressed by all of the positive reviews I came across so I decided to apply that night. I heard back much sooner than I expected and went in for an interview. I felt the interview went well, and I walked out with a much deeper understanding of what the position entailed. I would be heavily involved in marketing the Law Enforcement branch’s classes, working in Excel and DocuShare, creating and sending emails, cover letters, abstracts, etc. What I appreciated most about the whole interview experience and the follow-up was that my soon to be boss, Mr. Joseph DeStefano, never underemphasized how much work the position would be. He made it clear that, while it would not be a cake walk, the expectations would always be clear and achievable. From talking with the past interns, it was obvious to me the experience was nearly guaranteed to be one from which I would walk away with valuable skills for any future endeavors, academic or otherwise. I saw that the past interns felt a strong sense of accomplishment for what they had achieved, but also that they put in an enormous amount of time and effort to achieve it. I expected my experience to be no different.

I found I settled into the position quickly, as everyone was extremely professional and polite. As promised, I was never assigned a task without support or explanation of how to do it. I walked in believing I would be sent to my cubicle with strict instructions on what I was to do, but the reality was quite different. I was surprised at the amount of flexibility and say I had in how my projects developed. Every week, Mr. DeStefano met with us one-on-one to see how we felt about the internship, what we wanted to work on, what we did and did not like, and what would make the experience better for us. I found that refreshing, as I had never previously had a boss ask me what I wanted to work on. It was apparent to me at that point that Mr. DeStefano and all of my other supervisors were investing a substantial amount of time to make sure I got everything I could out of this internship. I have yet to have another experience like that.

With all of the time and attention my supervisors were taking to train me, it almost seemed as if the time they were investing was not worth the payoff for them, but my opinion changed after I got the hang of things. While my projects were not always glamorous and sometimes just involved typing names into an Excel sheet or sending out mass emails, it was always very rewarding to see the payoffs of that work in the form of new registrants.

I really appreciated that Mr. DeStefano made an effort to assign me business and marketing oriented projects that not only interested me but were relevant to me. While at first I was weary because I was the first intern without a criminal justice or law-related major, after seeing the different range of projects that the other interns and I were working on, it was evident any major could have a place here. Much of what I do relates to law enforcement but also requires skills in technology, marketing, researching, and advertising, among other fields. With such a wide variety of skills required for each project, I am confident the skills of students in any liberal arts major would be fully utilized here.

Overall, I am taking away from this experience everything I hoped for and much more. While it was every bit as much work as promised, I will end this internship confident I could not have spent the semester at a better institution than JASI and I would encourage other students looking for a similar experience. For more information, visit the JASI website. Students interested in applying for a position should visit the Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Network Symplicity system.

People-to-People Career Fair

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People to People Career Fair Flyer.jpgCalling all Liberal Arts majors! Spring Career Days may not always be tailored specifically for us, but there is something that is: the People-to-People Career Fair. Sponsored by the College of the Liberal Arts, College of Education, College of Health and Human Development, the Smeal College of Business, and Career Services, this one day event is the perfect place to meet employers searching for people from a wide range of degrees.  <calling all="" liberal="" arts="" majors!="" spring="" career="" days="" may="" not="" always="" be="" tailored="" specifically="" for="" us,="" but="" there="" is="" something="" that="" is:="" the=""

The People-to-People Career Fair will be held Tuesday, February 28, 2012 from 11:00 a.m. until 2:00 p.m. in Alumni Hall, HUB. It is an exciting and easy way to connect with recruiters who are offering internships, full time, part time, and volunteer positions. Employers will be on hand from a wide variety of sectors of the professional world, including: government and legal agencies, non profit organizations, law enforcement and more.

Below is a compiled list of potential employers whose job offerings apply specifically to students in the Liberal Arts. Keep in mind this is a short list, and there will be many more recruiters at the fair! Also, the categories below are a loose representation of the jobs that follow, many positions overlap.

Government

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    • <calling all="" liberal="" arts="" majors!="" spring="" career="" days="" may="" not="" always="" be="" tailored="" specifically="" for="" us,="" but="" there="" is="" something="" that="" is:="" the="" Internship: Fall/spring/summer

Public Service

Crime Law and Justice

For more information about any of the above employers, or to learn more about the fair, visit the People to People Career Fair website. As a note: dress for the event is business casual, employers expect students to be coming from class.

In addition to the People-to-People event, right next door the Sociology and Crime, Law, and Justice departments are hosting a Mentoring and Networking Session. Alumni from around the country will be returning to offer advice on internships and career paths. In addition, some alumni will be there to offer employment opportunities! If you would like to attend, you may RSVP through the Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Network’s Symplicity website.

Hope to see you there!

Job Search Tips and Economic Consulting from Bates-White

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Hello! My name is Julia Schrank, and I’m a Network Assistant at the Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Network (CEN). Last week, I attended an information session held by Bates-White, LLC on behalf of the CEN. Their recruiters had some fresh tips about searching for jobs and also explained the intriguing field of economic consulting. I hope this post chronicling my night at the session is helpful to you in your own job search!

Right away, I knew that Ben and Joe were not typical recruiters. First of all, they introduced themselves as “Ben and Joe,” as if I had known them all of my life. Also, they had this undeniably sophisticated air about them; both were impeccably dressed, and Joe’s round-frame, gold glasses made him look like a scholar of yesteryear.

Their affability juxtaposed with their formal appearances threw me off the trail a little bit when, almost instantly, the two revealed that they were Penn State alumni. Ben graduated in 2007 as an Economics and Math major, and Joe graduated in 2006 also with a degree in Economics. I guess I wasn’t used to thinking of Penn Staters as sophisticated intellectuals rather than casual students like me!

Their Penn State background, combined with their senior consultant positions, made them very credible hosts for the first half of their presentation, which they called the “Job Search Workshop.” Here are some of their best tips from the presentation:

1) Remember that it is easier to make a bad impression than a good one.
Because they openly want all Penn State students to succeed, Ben and Joe described some faux pas that they’ve seen at the Career Fair in the past. It peeved them when interested individuals would act as though they knew what the firm did, but then provide the wrong information! They emphatically reminded us to research companies beforehand, because the Career Fair is “as much for you to learn about employers as for employers to learn about you.” More research beforehand equals more time for you to sell your qualifications to the employer!

2) Follow up with someone after the first interaction.
For example, it pays to contact the recruiter you met at the Career Fair, or to check with Career Services to see if there is a local representative for the company in their network.

3) “Avoid hyperbole” in your cover letter.
They emphasized that they don’t need you to praise the company in an overwhelming way, and that employers are much more interested in how you and your skills can fit into their company.

4) A resume needs to be “short and punchy.”
It should be a “one page snapshot of why you’re qualified,” and you should do your best to avoid redundancy between your application, cover letter, and resume.

5) Your transcript should reflect academic challenges and be easy to read.
“It’s not impressive to brag about how easy all of your classes were. Employers want to see you challenging yourself,” Ben noted. As for readability, he added that when Penn State transcripts are copied into Microsoft Word, formatting issues often arise. If the formatting is off, spend some time playing around with spacing and fonts to make your transcript easy to read. But in most cases, the best idea is to download a PDF of your transcript directly from eLion.

After this platter of advice, they moved on to talking about types of interviews. At the session, I touched base with attendee Rachel Franceschino, who said that their description of one specific interview, the ‘case’ interview was particularly helpful. “[The employer] told me that I would be working in a group of other applicants to solve a problem in four hours,” Rachel said, “So [their description of a case interview] was definitely helpful.”

According to Ben and Joe, if an employer specifies the sort of information that Rachel received, you will have a ‘case’ or ‘work’ interview in which your problem-solving ability and your analysis will be tested using an actual scenario that might be given to employees of the firm. To this, they added cheekily: “Don’t psych yourself out!”

Finally, they spoke about the intense field of economic consulting, which, in short, is the preparation of detailed economic reports for law firms that ultimately become “what they present as expert economic opinions” in court.

As always, if you would like to learn more about Bates-White, LLC or job hunt advice in general, don’t hesitate to stop by the Career Enrichment Network!

My Day at the Career Fair

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Hello! My name is Julia Schrank, and I’m a Network Assistant at the Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Network (CEN). On Monday, I had the opportunity to go to Spring Career Days on behalf of the CEN, and I decided to record all that I saw and did there so that LAUS@PSU readers could benefit from all that I learned, and maybe even decide to attend a Fair!

I arrived at the BJC a bit earlier than I had planned, so I was waiting alone in a corner, looking around like a deer in the headlights, for the Director of the CEN, Susan, to arrive.

Just when I was about to give myself over to the nerves of those trudging in starchy suits around me, I saw a familiar face: Emma Decker, an English major who I know from the Liberal Arts Undergraduate Council (LAUC). She looked fabulous, in a sharp blazer with her blond curly hair coiffed to perfection.

Emma’s presence is proof in itself that Liberal Arts students do indeed attend the Career Fair with a fresh sense of determination and specific goals. As for Emma’s goals at the Fair: “Today I’m here to see CIGNA and ABC Supply because they both are based in Philly, and I know that they are looking for interns,” she said. I was really impressed to see that Emma was determined to make her mark even at booths for a health insurance firm and a housing supplier, respectively.

Another of my first observations at Gate A was a shocking one: it seemed like at least 40% of the students here had absolutely no idea what to wear to a business formal event. I saw people in jeans, girls in “weekend” heels, and unkempt heads of hair all around me. After seeing some of these people, I know that a “dress for success” blog post is wholly necessary!

Once Susan arrived, she wasted no time in giving my fellow intern, Juliana Viau, and me some important tips about navigating the BJC during the Fair. One of these tips, humorously, was to “always take the blue stairs to get from floor to floor…the gray stairs lead all of the way out of the building!”

She also capitalized on the point that “employers are not grouped by major,” mostly because it would be very awkward for competitors to be right next to each other, offering interviews to the same set of students! As a result, she emphasized, “you need to do your research before you come. As you can see, it’s very hard to figure out who to talk to when you’re actually here.”

Her observation rang true; the labyrinthine array of blue and white screens did a good job of sectioning and separating the employers from each other, and Juliana and I were a little overwhelmed when Susan left us to take a look around for ourselves.

One of the first booths we visited was for SRA International, a firm that creates technology for the intelligence community. This sounded to us like they weren’t looking for Liberal Arts majors, but the genial, British recruiter replied, “We are tech folks, but we’re also looking for policy people [in] international business, English, and political science to be proposal writers and technical writers.” His comrade then added, cheekily, “We hire smart people.”

It turns out that even companies that had signs for specific majors were ultimately just looking for “smart people” as well. I spoke to an amiable representative from CGI, a tech solutions company that has contracted with the US government, about the sign at her booth that said “Supply Chain, Marketing, and IT.” When I asked her if that was the be-all, end-all for CGI, she quickly replied, “Oh no; we do what we call ‘nontraditional recruiting’ as well. We need people with analytical skills and documentation skills.”

Dick’s Sporting Goods also capitalized on the skills, not the majors, that their company wanted, and added an interesting request: “We want our employees to live the sports lifestyle and be really passionate about sports.” They certainly came to the right university!

Finally, we went to speak to the National Geo-spatial Intelligence Agency (NGA, pictured). Gregarious recruiter Paula, although not entirely sure what Liberal Arts actually meant, was sure that our skill-set would come in handy somewhere in her company. She cited a position in a field called “human geography,” and, after Juliana and I mentioned our anthropology department, she replied enthusiastically that “We definitely need anthro majors for this department. If you go on our website, these positions will come up under ‘political geography’.”

At the end of my day at the BJC, I felt significantly more relaxed than when I came in. I realized it was really quite easy to talk to recruiters, and that many are just regular people who, as Susan said, “are looking for good assets for their organizations.” Many of them, like Paula from NGA, come to the fair just because they love interacting with young people and building their brand.

This struck me as not being unlike an attitude we would have here at Penn State; we love interacting with alumni of all ages, and we, too, are always supportive of our Penn State brand.

So in the end, I would certainly recommend that any Liberal Arts major check out the Career Fair. If you do your research beforehand (Like I did in this blog post!), it proves to be a fun experience that allows you to meet all sorts of interesting, passionate people. Also, you never know if you’ll be one of those “smart people” that these companies can’t wait to hire!

Taking on the Career Fair

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Spring Career Days
Originally uploaded by pennstatelive

Spring Career Days at the BJC can be incredibly daunting: tables for huge, brand-name corporations, recruiters scanning like hawks, and flurries of business cards and resumes.To make things even more daunting, it seems like nobody is looking for Liberal Arts majors like us!

As a Network Assistant at the Liberal Arts Career Enrichment Network, I want you to know that this is absolutely not the case! Many employers are indeed looking for creative, eloquent, and ambitious people, and there’s no better place to find them than in the College of the Liberal Arts.

So, who should you talk to at the Spring Career Days fair on Monday, February 6 (Bus., Comm., Mgmt, Sales, and Lib Arts day)? I’ve taken some of the work out of the search for you and made the following list of recruiters you should definitely talk to, including a link to each company’s website. Also, so you know what you’re getting into, I also found some sample positions that might be of interest to you as a Liberal Arts major.

Social Media and Internet Communications
Burlington Coat Factory
Sample Jobs: Social and Media Relations Intern
Campus Special, LLC
Mentioned in their overview: Media, Consulting, International Relations
WebpageFX
Sample positions: Social Media Networker, Summer Internship- Internet Marketer

Economics
You don’t necessarily need to be an ECON major to score some of these jobs; these companies just want to see critical thinking…the hallmark of a Liberal Arts scholar!

Bates-White, LLC
Sample Positions: Summer economic consultant
Federal Energy Regulatory Commission
Sample Positions: Economist
*FERC requires a hard copy of your resume at their booth.

Human Resources
Human resources careers span multiple fields and are in great demand. The following companies are looking for HR personnel:

Mars, Inc. Chocolate North America
Newel Rubbermaid
PPG Industries
Shipley Energy
SRA International
United States Army Recruiting
UPMC
Verizon Corporation
WESCO Distribution

Other
Harrisburg Semester Internship and Seminar Program
Mentioned in their overview: Legislation, Policy, Lobbying

For more information about these employers and others coming to the fair:

  1. Go to the Nittany Lion Career Network page.
  2. Click Student Login (in the gray box), and use your AccessID and password. 
  3. Scroll to the bottom right of page, and select “Spring Career Days 2012” to see employer descriptions in a list that you can filter!

Also, you may want to take advantage of some pre-fair activities, listed on the Spring Career Days page, to make you stand out to employers even more.

Going into the fair, remember that it’s perfectly okay to talk to anyone and everyone! Even if you have no interest in a company at the outset, you can always benefit from asking the recruiter for more details. Sometimes the recruiter who comes to the fair is not the same one who registered online, and therefore additional positions might be available! Finally, even if you have no interest in say, a mineral sands company, you can still look at this as a way to get free practice for the next recruiter…who might actually matter to you!

I hope knowing that there are some employers who want you might help make the Fair seem less intimidating, or maybe even make you decide to attend. Best of luck, and see you at the fair!

A Career Days Success Story

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Penn State Career Fair
Originally uploaded by pennstatelive

During my time at Penn State people always stressed the importance of being involved. No matter what your interests are, use this time to cultivate them so you can figure out what you enjoy. While in school I wasn’t sure what I ultimately wanted to do, so I figured trying a bunch of different things was the best way to find out what I liked and what I was good at. In my case, volunteering and interning gave me a better sense of what I did not want to do. I interned for a local paper, a Congressman, and an HR department and realized these jobs were not for me. However, I still made great contacts and got a better sense of what these jobs truly entailed. Even though I did not want to pursue a job at any of the places I interned, I was able to obtain contacts and references that could speak to my work ethic and ability. Academically, I pursued a major in journalism and a major in psychology to broaden my potential career choices and to satisfy my interests.

My favorite experience at Penn State was interning at the Bank of America Career Services Center as a mock interviewer during my senior year. I got the chance to sit down with students and interview them before their real job or graduate school interview. Even though I knew I did not want to be a recruiter, I realized that I was an effective communicator and enjoyed working with people one on one. My involvement at the career services center helped me become better acquainted with my own skillset, in addition to all of the services offered to students. I utilized these services and took a personality test to assess my strengths, weaknesses, and potential job prospects. I met with a counselor to discuss my test results and review my resume.

During the fall semester of my senior year, I researched the employers attending the career fair. I looked at what majors they were hiring and looked out for any potential matches. It was tough to find companies interested in a liberal arts major, as I found most employers strongly leaned toward engineers and business majors. However, I attended the career fair to speak with my employers of interest and to hand out my resume. As I approached recruiters at the Career Fair I was able to articulate how my skillset transferred to the internship and volunteer positions I had previously held. I was able to elaborate on how these skills prepared me for a professional career. I ended up making a great connection with one of the recruiters from SRA International, a company that provides consulting services for clients within national security and civil government. In addition to this, I posted my resume on the Nittany Lion Career Network. I applied for a technical writing position at SRA and obtained an interview. I researched the company and went into the interview with an open-mind and a positive attitude. Following the second interview, I was offered a job that I have been at for the past three years.

Having internship experience and figuring out what my skills were helped me to eliminate options that were not for me. If you are interested in a certain job, obtain an internship or shadow someone so you can get a feel for the environment and what it takes to be successful. Being proactive opens so many doors down the road. There are a lot of opportunities available to gain valuable experience if you decide to make the effort and reach out. These experiences are vital when interviewing for prospective job position. Penn State offers amazing opportunities to intern or volunteer within any avenue of interest. Try new things, make connections, and stay positive. Most employers are looking for candidates with transferable skills and good attitudes. Those things are what make Penn State students a top choice among recruiters.