Saturday, September 3, 2022
10 am — Noon
Cheel Campus Center, Barben Rooms
As part of BT’s 65th Anniversary weekend in Potsdam, we are working with the university to create a unique event so that we can spend time in relaxed conversation with current Clarkson students. During our many trips to Clarkson over the years for teaching, hiring, mentoring, and sporting events we have found one of the highlights of a campus visit is interacting with all those brilliant young people on the threshold of their careers. Feedback from students is consistent – they love to meet alumni to learn about the world of work after graduation and to gain insights into succeeding on their career paths.
Remember your experience at Clarkson, trying to complete your studies and gearing up for stressful job interviews? If you were like us, you had little knowledge about the job market and you had few if any contacts to help you understand and prepare for the challenges ahead of you. You probably had 100 questions about job opportunities in your major, what companies might be hiring, how to dress for an interview, what questions to ask the recruiter, and how to maximize the power of your resume. Going a bit further – should you take a safe job in your hometown or take the risk of moving across the country, are you better off getting a graduate degree first or getting some work experience, what can you expect in your first job, how do you prepare yourself to gain advancement into more senior positions?
When we visit Clarkson, we take the time to meet with students and they are always excited to meet alumni who have run the gauntlet of the job market. It is so rewarding to listen to the students talk about their challenges and uncertainties and to offer them coaching about the best way to respond to the opportunities in front of them. The students, and their professors and administrators, are always so grateful for the opportunity to ask their questions in a low-pressure, non-threatening environment. We always leave campus excited about the quality of Clarkson students and a little humble about how much better prepared they are than we were all those years ago!
Please note – this is not a job fair, and we are not asking you to interview students or to point them to specific job opportunities. Rather it is a chance for the students to meet alumni and to talk casually about the diverse career paths available to them after Clarkson. They will appreciate the opportunity to discuss with you their education choices and plans, and to ask you a few of those burning questions that will help them make important decisions. Potential topics we have suggested to the students include:
– The current state of the economy and job market in 2022
– The types of jobs available with a specific major
– Life lessons learned during your career as an alumnus
– What employers are looking for from job candidates
– Potential employers that might be a fit for a student
– Networking opportunities available to students
– Key success factors in the career of a Clarkson graduate
– How to build relationships with potential mentors
We hope you will join us in this exciting event! Craig Ferris ’77 & Ed Robinson ’74