More than 100 companies were present at USD career fair
DIEGO LUNA | BUSINESS EDITOR | THE USD VISTA | @diegotothemoon
Photo Courtesy of USD Career Development Center/ Facebook
Students had the opportunity to meet various employers in UC forum C.
Every year the University of San Diego hosts a variety of events that promote job growth in an array of fields in both the public and private sectors.
This school year USD has hosted an engineering career fair, graduate school fair, non-profit career fair, and most recently, the career exposition, or career expo for short. All of these events have been put forth by the Career Development Center, which is located in Manchester Hall room 101.
On Thursday, Feb. 25 a copious amount of students gathered in and around UC Forum C to catch a glimpse of their potential employers.
At the same time, a few business students mentioned that they were extrinsically motivated by the two passport points that were available.
For students, the career expo is an entryway to a prosperous career. In some ways the career expo continuously enhances the prospect of employment for many undergraduate students as well as graduate students through frequent networking events, consistent relationships with USD alumni, alumni businesses, and by bringing industry experts to campus to share their advice.
USD alumna Brianna Kirkpatrick graduated with a degree in psychology and now works for Adobe Systems. Kirkpatrick explains how the career expo was the passageway to her job at Adobe.
“I met Jeff, a USD alum, who is now the VP of Talent Acquisition at Adobe,” Kirkpatrick said. “After following up with thank yous after the event, they replied back about an open position and interview schedule. I got the job and began the following June.”
Adobe Systems is one of the many companies that is continuously a top employer for USD graduates.
Other big name employers that hire USD grads include Ernst & Young, Sempra Energy, Boeing, Stanford University, the LA Times, Google, Apple, Amazon, Qualcomm, Merrill Lynch, and even the FBI.
However, simply going to a USD career fair will not ensure you’ll have a job as soon as you leave the forums. But you might have a better idea of what company, institution, or industry you’d like to be a part of, whether it be for-profit or nonprofit.
Junior Miroslava Gomez is a business major and shares her experience talking to the various companies at this year’s career expo.
“I liked it although I felt a little clustered only because there was diverted companies scattered everywhere,” Gomez said. “It was hard to find the business companies. In regards to talking to each company, it was very comforting and some of them even approached me.”
While one may suspect that it is intimidating to talk to these big companies, many of the talent recruiters have been in our position and know what it’s like trying to strike meaningful conversation with a complete stranger. But as Gomez said, the chances of talent recruiters approaching you is also very likely.
Maybe, interviewing for a full-time position at a Fortune-500 company is not within your scope this year.
However, maybe your goal is to start small at a local non-profit and work your way up to Apple Computers headquarters in Silicon Valley, or even the LA based company, Buzzfeed.
In fact, last year 92 percent of graduating seniors received their first job within three months of graduating and 68 percent participated in some kind of internship position, of which, 52 summer internships dispersed $2,000 to each intern.
If any of this statistical information appeals to any Toreros, you’re in luck. USD will continue to host more career workshops, expos, and other career related activities that students can find out about by reading their school newspaper, The USD Vista.