Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, all of the CPDC’s events, except for the Professional Headshot sessions, were transitioned from in-person to virtual. The CPDC held six different virtual events for students. Two of our events were brand new this semester and exceptionally successful!
The Fall 2020 semester kicked off with the Accounting & Finance Career and Internship Fair. Organizations hosted group sessions and one-on-one meetings with accounting, corporate finance and investments, finance, mathematics, economics, international business and general business students to share details on their company, internships and/or full-time accounting and finance-related opportunities. The fair was our first virtual event experience and we thought it was very successful!
Over sixty students participated and met with 19 organizations. Students highly rated the variety of employers and the overall organization of the event. “Everything was set up perfectly and the instructors were very informative.” remarked a student.
We then hosted the Sophomore PDS Virtual Open Houses; Sophomore PDS students attended guided information sessions to learn about what services the Career and Professional Development Center provides and what resources are available to all students. Students learned about career coaching, events, online resources, Handshake and Bison Boutique. Students also learned the CPDC offers career services to Bison FOR LIFE!
The next event was the first in a series titled Career Exploration Event: Creative Careers. For the third year in a row, we had a fantastic lineup of professional guests including three alumni. The heart of this event was creativity! Students with a concentration related to English, history, marketing, digital & social media marketing, marketing analytics, communication, or entrepreneurship were able to chat with professional guests about their creative career paths/professions and/or businesses. One student commented, “The speakers were kind and informative. I felt like they wanted to be here and cared about our success and growth”.
We had over 100 students attend From Senior in College to Freshman in Life! Jeff Thomas ’12 and Taylor Ross ’13 returned to provide unique perspectives on how to make a successful transition into life after Nichols College. Topics included: Pre-Graduation Planning, Career Paths, Personal Finances, and Investments/Retirement Planning. “I absolutely loved this event! I learned so much about budgeting and the pathway of jobs. It was so valuable as both Jeff and Taylor are heavily involved with Nichols and were able to be genuine with their responses.” commented a student attendee.
Career Exploration Event: Helping Professions was our second event held in our series. This was a fabulous opportunity for Nichols students with a concentration related to criminal justice, criminal justice management or psychology to speak with contacts within these specific industries. Of the 23 participants who attended the event, 20 rated the event an overall rating of 4.41 out of 5.
The final event in our series was titled Career Exploration Event: Managing the Herd. This was a brand new event this fall and was extremely successful! With so many wonderful management-related concentrations here at Nichols, such as human resource management, hospitality management, sport management, and management, we wanted to create a specific event to focus on these majors. This fall it was given a 4.51/5.
Collectively, for the Fall 2020 semester, the six Nichols events were given a 4.57/5 overall success rate.
We had several students and event hosts leave positive feedback in our event assessment surveys. A few that we received were:
“As in prior years, it was a personally rewarding experience to be able to give students insight on how to make the transition to life after Nichols. For many students, finding their first-time role is a stressful experience, especially given the current environment, but hopefully, we were able to provide ways to proactively navigate this transition.”
“I feel like I gained a lot out of this discussion. I learned so much about how to go forward with my life after college. I really thought this was beneficial to me and I think Jeff and Taylor did a great job. ”
We would like to thank all of the employers, students and alumni who attended events during the fall semester!
