Spotlight for Career Services Professionals
Spotlight for Recruiting Professionals
When it comes to the key resources college students report using while looking for jobs and internships, they not only use employer websites most, but find them the most useful as well.
Among respondents to NACE’s 2018 Student Survey, 77.4 percent of those seeking a full-time job reported using employer websites. Furthermore, more than half of those using websites found them to be a “very” to “extremely” useful resource. (See Figure 1.)
Students seeking a full-time job also considered personal confidantes—such as friends (69.0 percent use; 36.7 percent find “very” to “extremely” useful) and family (59.3 percent use; 31.7 percent find “very” to “extremely” useful)—the second and third most used and useful resources, respectively. Career/job fairs, faculty members, and the career center were all used by approximately half of these students; about one-quarter to one-fifth found these resources useful.
Among students searching for internship/co-op positions, the results are similar, with employer websites topping the list in terms of use (71 percent) and usefulness (41.3 percent). (See Figure 2.) In addition, the percentages who reported using friends, family, career/job fairs, faculty, and the career center were nearly identical to those reported by students seeking full-time employment. This was also the case in terms of usefulness ratings—they aligned across the two groups.
Differences among the two groups were slight, e.g., students seeking full-time jobs saw ads as more useful than their internship/co-op-seeking counterparts did, while the latter group gave employer representatives on campus and employment recruitment brochures higher marks.
The 2018 Student Survey Report details the attitudes, behaviors, and outcomes for bachelor’s degree students at all class levels. (Note: Previous reports provided data only on graduating seniors.) The focus of this report is the 22,109 bachelor’s degree students from the 2017-18 academic school year (July 1, 2017 through June 30, 2018). Breakdowns by class level are as follows: 4,336 freshmen, 4,174 sophomores, 5,709 juniors, and 7,890 graduating seniors. Data collection took place from February 14, 2018, to April 30, 2018. The 2018 Student Survey Report will be released this fall.
Figure 1: Percent of students seeking a full-time position who used and rated resources “very” to “extremely” useful
|
Resource |
Used in Job Search |
Considered Useful |
| Employer websites |
77.4% |
50.3% |
| Friends |
69.0% |
36.7% |
| Parents and/or relatives |
59.3% |
31.7% |
| Career/job fairs |
54.6% |
26.2% |
| Faculty members |
48.0% |
26.5% |
| Career center |
47.4% |
21.6% |
| Ads in job-search/recruitment publications/magazines |
40.8% |
17.3% |
| Employer information presentations on campus |
40.3% |
19.8% |
| Employer representatives on campus |
36.9% |
19.7% |
| Alumni |
32.9% |
14.9% |
| Trade/professional associations |
32.1% |
16.6% |
| Employer recruitment brochures (print) |
30.3% |
13.3% |
| Articles in newspapers/magazines |
22.4% |
7.4% |
| Virtual career fairs |
19.8% |
9.0% |
Source: 2018 Student Survey Report, National Association of Colleges and Employers
Figure 2: Percent of students seeking an internship/co-op position who used and rated resources “very” to “extremely” useful
|
Resource |
Used in Job Search |
Considered Useful |
| Employer websites |
71.0% |
41.3% |
| Friends |
64.8% |
33.8% |
| Parents and/or relatives |
57.5% |
31.3% |
| Career/job fairs |
55.9% |
26.9% |
| Career center |
52.2% |
24.6% |
| Faculty members |
51.7% |
29.7% |
| Employer information presentations on campus |
43.9% |
21.8% |
| Employer representatives on campus |
40.6% |
21.0% |
| Ads in job-search/recruitment publications/magazines |
38.5% |
13.9% |
| Employer recruitment brochures (print) |
33.5% |
14.1% |
| Alumni |
31.6% |
15.3% |
| Trade/professional associations |
27.8% |
14.5% |
| Articles in newspapers/magazines |
22.2% |
6.7% |
| Virtual career fairs |
19.1% |
8.9% |
Source: 2018 Student Survey Report, National Association of Colleges and Employers