The Center for Career and Professional Development will host the inaugural Blue & Gold Career Fair on Thursday, September 19 from 4:30 to 6 p.m. in the lobby of the Henderson Campus Center, coinciding with Blue & Gold weekend. The event will provide a space for students to meet alumni and potential recruiters for networking and business opportunities. In addition, attendees will get a chance to take professional headshots and enter raffles for various prizes.
One of the organizers, Associate Director of Alumni and Employer Engagement Autumn Parker, ’16, spoke about the importance of the career fair.
“This event fair is coming from scaled recruitment events that my office has led,” Parker said. “Last year, we had the PITT career fair that was in October and we had about 20 employers commit.
Many of those were alumni-affiliated and we had well over 50, nearly 60 students travel and attend that event. There was a clear investment within the last year, and two years, of those efforts that showcase we’re trying to get back to that interpersonal career readiness and professional development building through employer relations and alumni supplementing.”
Parker emphasized how much the career fair had built upon prior events similar to it. Of the 25-employer goal she had set, 26 had already committed to appearing at the event. She also spoke about the importance of students registering to attend the fair through Handshake, which had already gotten to 72 students of her 100 student goal.
“That all showcases that there is an eagerness for people to connect and make sense of their career pathway explorations and considerations with people that they trust,” Parker said. “Who were in their shoes, who can humanize this experience and empower them to leverage their Allegheny living and learning experience, converting it into something meaningful and to the greater world.”
CCPD also worked in tandem with the Office of Sustainability and the IDEAS Center to create the Career Closet. Located in the Office of Sustainability in the basement of the Tippie Alumni Center, the Career Closet is a sustainable clothing resource to supply individuals with business attire for interviews, presentations and other events. While still in its beginning stages, the Career Closet plans to be a staple in campus resources to be used with other resources, such as the Gator Success Grant. Another organizer, Nicole Ross, director of human resources, spoke about how the Career Closet came to be.
“Last year, while talking with students, the topic presented itself regarding their lack of appropriate professional clothing for occasions like interviews, class presentations and other academic or career-related activities,” Ross said over email. “This shortage of resources was causing some stress among these students, and I realized that the Allegheny community could undoubtedly step in to offer support in a new way.”
Ross began by reaching out to Sustainability Coordinator Kurt Hatcher, ’07, and Director of Sustainability Kelly Boulton, ’02, at the Office of Sustainability. Ross then reached out to staff members and individuals from other departments to see if they would be willing to donate clothes they didn’t need. The team held two donation drives and set up the clothes, shoes and other items they received on the first floor of the Tippie Alumni Center.
“Though we are still refining processes, referral methods, space, and resources, we’ve made significant progress,” Ross said. “We’re excited about the ongoing support we can offer students as they continue to achieve academic and professional success.”
Hatcher spoke about the process of obtaining clothes from the Career Closet, as well as its significance in sustainability.
“We’re going to put out the information for faculty advisors, (senior comprehensive project) advisors, anyone who would supervise a student on campus, and really anyone who would be working with a student on research,” Hatcher said. “Even if it’s not comp research, but something that you could take to a conference and present at a session, those are all good reasons to need more professional attire. We’ll let all those people know that there’s a very simple form you can fill out that comes back to my email inbox, and then that triggers me to reach out to that student to schedule time to come in and see if there’s something in the collection of donations that will fit their need.”
Hatcher spoke to the theme of sustainability, especially as it relates to the Career Closet. Clothes that haven’t been used or are lightly worn can be given a new use by students who need them.
“Kelly and I see the vibrancy of the community as part of sustainability,” Hatcher said. “We aren’t just concerned with reducing our energy use or our water use or being more environmentally friendly in physical ways — we see that there’s a dimension of a healthy community that has access to the resources it needs. There’s a social element to sustainability and we think that this dovetails with that part of the mission.”