Description:

It can be really frustrating for first-generation students who come from families and communities without connections to internships and jobs, considering their importance to social mobility. In the present-day virtual environment and constricted job market, first-generation students are feeling more unprepared, anxious, and lost in their internship and job search than ever before. As career professionals know, internships are proven to increase student’s persistence, retention, graduation rates, and social mobility. However, obtaining these internships isn’t equitable. According to Designing Your Life by Burnett and Evans, only 20% of positions are posted online, which is where 90% of students focus their job/internship search efforts. According to Forbes (2019), only 2% of online applications receive an initial interview. However, if students can identify an internal advocate, they are 12 times more likely to earn the position (Brown, Setren, & Topa, 2014). For the 80% of positions that aren’t advertised online---the ones in the hidden job market---they disproportionately go to students who come from families with connections. That’s the bad news. The good news is that if students like Marieli are taught how to build professional relationships from scratch, aka cold networking, in an effort to tap into the hidden job market, they can have great results. In a 2020 study published in the NACE Journal, Sean O’Keefe and Barry Posner concluded that a first-generation student who engaged in cold networking was 38 percent more likely to earn an internship and four times more likely to have their internships turn into jobs than first-generation students who did not similarly reach out. Marieli is one of those students. Because of Marieli’s mandatory career education, for-credit, course, she was taught how to create professional relationships by leveraging her student status. The class required her to reach out to professionals and request career conversations. At first, Marieli had concerns about this intimidating request. However, it was the best assignment Marieli had throughout her college experience. It helped her build a lot of self-confidence by developing the agency to take initiative to meet with professionals at organizations she was interested in working for. One of the conversations led to her landing an interview for an internship in the hidden job market, and she got the position! Landing an internship the summer between sophomore and junior year boosted her resume, gave her an inside look at the civil engineering industry, and helped her gain clarity in terms of career discernment for life after college. Marieli’s story personifies the positive impact of colleges requiring career education courses. To truly create career equity on college campuses, it is imperative to require career education courses to help level the playing field for all students. Research shows that first-generation students do not engage in optional career services as frequently as continuing generation students. This is why teaching students how to intentionally and proactively develop professional relationships from scratch is a life-enhancing skill that will improve student post-college outcomes, social mobility, and return on investment. Marieli and Sean will encourage the audience to emphasize teaching students how to build social capital from scratch in career education courses. Their message aligns with the proverb: “Give people a fish and you feed them for a day, but teach people how to fish and you feed them for a lifetime.”

Audience:

Career Services

Level:

Intermediate

Track:

Competencies & Skills

Type:

Traditional

Main Speaker:

Sean O'Keefe, Santa Clara University

Additional Speakers:

Marieli Rubio, Santa Clara University