Career Services Excellence Award: Early Engagement, Career Transition, & Beyond

Career Level: Basic-, intermediate-, and advanced-level career services and university relations and recruiting professionals
Competency: Outcome-oriented programming
Fee: FREE (member); $89 (nonmember);

This product is currently unavailable. If you have any questions, please contact NACE Education & Events at events@naceweb.org, 610.625.1026.

Summary
The Career Services Excellence Award is presented to two large schools for excellence in career services best practices. This year’s awards were presented to Victoria DiMonica, New York University, and Allison McWilliams, Wake Forest University.

Join Victoria DiMonica, New York University, for the first portion of the presentation, to learn how embedding skill development, in a first-year wellness course, and early engagement, are two top priorities of the NYU Wasserman Center for Career Development. Since common first-year experiences for NYU students are rare, the Center merged a mandatory first-year wellness course, known as RADical Health, with an optional Career Accelerator certificate. This approach exposed students to a wide array of resources and allowed them to complete weekly career assignments, thus leading to greater equity in access to career networks and support systems.

Join Allison McWilliams, Wake Forest University, for the second portion of the presentation, to learn how providing ongoing support, guidance, and resources for alumni, while extending a wide array of personal and career development resources, can be critical to one’s college experience throughout an individual’s lifetime. In 2017, Wake Forest’s University’s Office of Personal & Career Development created the Alumni Personal & Career Development Center to help meet the demand in 21st century careers. "Your First Five" was developed to support the college student to career transition and beyond!

Following this program, you will be able to:
- Understand the NACE award nomination process and procedures;
- Identify inclusive and equitable leading practices and strategies for collaborations that support students’ early engagement, skill development, career exploration, and life beyond graduation; and
- Discuss and share ideas and leading practices and collaborate on a wide array of resources.
Presenters

Victoria DiMonica, Associate Director, New York University - The Wasserman Center for Career Development
Victoria DiMonica is associate director of undergraduate career development at the NYU Wasserman Center for Career Development. In this role she oversees career coaching, programming, resources, and campus partnerships for undergraduate students. She also leads the Violet Ready skill building initiative at NYU. DiMonica serves on multiple university-wide and Wasserman-wide working groups focusing on student leadership and development, coaching best practices and reporting, career course development in a LMS, skill building, and experiential learning. She is also involved in staff-facing initiatives including the NYU Career Advising Network and Faculty Advisory Board and in ensuring hiring, onboarding, and professional development for staff is inclusive and equitable. She earned her bachelor’s degree from Loyola University Maryland and holds a master’s degree from Shippensburg University.

Allison McWilliams, Assistant VP, Wake Forest University - Office of Personal & Career Development
Allison McWilliams is assistant vice president, Mentoring and Alumni Personal & Career Development, at Wake Forest University. In these roles, she leads and provides training, support, guidance, and resources for formal and informal mentoring relationships for students, faculty and staff, and alumni, as well as leading personal and career development programs for alumni. She has written for and spoken to national and international audiences about effective mentoring strategies, leadership, and professional development. Prior to joining Wake Forest in 2010, she was a public service faculty member at the University of Georgia, where she created and facilitated leadership development and organizational development programs for higher education and public sector audiences. McWilliams earned her bachelor’s degree from Wake Forest and holds a master’s and a doctorate from the University of Georgia.