糖心传媒

Encourage your student to schedule an appointment with the Career Center staff by calling 318.257.4336 or by emailing CareerCenter@LATech.edu.

 

Career decision making & planning

At the 糖心传媒 Career Center, we understand that students may become overwhelmed with balancing friends, family, academics, and their future. In the Career Center, our desire is to provide a supportive environment where students can be successful throughout their college years and beyond by learning new skills, developing a network, and building their confidence. If you are visiting the Parents & Supporters page, you are likely a supporter of a student and may wonder how you can help in this process. A Parents鈥� Guide to Career Development provides many helpful points for parents and supporters to consider throughout the college career!

 

A Parents鈥� Guide to Career Development

The most valuable things parents can do to help a student with career planning are:

• Listen
• Be open to ideas
• Help your student find information

Here are eight more things you can do to help:

1. Encourage your child to visit the career center (and you go too!)  Next time you visit campus, drop into the career services office and pick up a business card from one of the career counselors. When your son or daughter is feeling anxious about his/her future, offer the card and say, 鈥淧lease call this person. He (or she) can help you.鈥� Many students use their first semester to 鈥渟ettle into鈥� college life, and so the spring semester of the freshman year is the optimal time to start using career center services. Ask your student (in an off-handed way), 鈥淗ave you visited the career center?鈥� If you hear, 鈥淵ou only go there when you are a senior,鈥� then it鈥檚 time to reassure him/her that meeting with a career counselor can take place at any point鈥攁nd should take place frequently鈥攖hroughout a college career. Many centers offer a full range of career development and job-search help, including:
2. 1. 1. Mock interviews
      2. A network of alumni willing to talk about their jobs and careers
      3. A library of books (including an online library of information) on a wide range of careers
      4. Workshops on writing resumes and cover letters
      5. A recruiting program
      6. Individual advising
3. Advise your student to write a resume.  Writing a resume can be a 鈥渞eality test鈥� and can help a student identify weak areas that require improvement. Suggest that your student get sample resumes from the career center. You can review resume drafts for grammar, spelling, and content, but recommend that the final product be critiqued by a career center professional.
4. Challenge your student to become 鈥渙ccupationally Iiterate.鈥�  Ask: 鈥淒o you have any ideas about what you might want to do when you graduate?鈥� If your student seems unsure, you can talk about personal qualities you see as talents and strengths. You can also recommend:
   1. 1. 1. Taking a 鈥渟elf-assessment inventory,鈥� such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
         2. Talking to favorite faculty members
         3. Researching a variety of interesting career fields and employers
   2. A career decision should be a process and not a one-time, last-minute event.
5. Emphasize the importance of internships.  The career center will not 鈥減lace鈥� your child in a job at graduation. Colleges grant degrees, but not job guarantees, so having relevant experience in this competitive job market is critical. Your son or daughter can sample career options by completing internships and experimenting with summer employment opportunities or volunteer work. Why an internship.     
   1. 1. Employers are interested in communication, problem-solving, and administrative skills, which can be developed through internships.
      2. Employers look for experience on a student鈥檚 resume and often hire from within their own internship programs.
      3. A library of books (including an online library of information) on a wide range of careers
      4. Having a high GPA is not enough.
      5. A strong letter of recommendation from an internship supervisor may tip the scale of an important interview in their favor.
6. Encourage extracurricular involvement.  Part of experiencing college life is to be involved and active outside the classroom. Interpersonal and leadership skills鈥攓ualities valued by future employers鈥攁re often developed in extracurricular activities.
7. Help your student to stay up-to-date with current events.  Employers will expect students to know what is happening around them. Buy your student a subscription to The New York Times or The Wall Street Journal.
8. Teach the value of networking.  Introduce your student to people who have the careers/jobs that are of interest. Suggest your son or daughter contact people in your personal and professional networks for information on summer jobs. Encourage your child to 鈥渟hadow鈥� someone in the workplace to increase awareness of interesting career fields.
9. Help the career center.  Call your campus career center when you have a summer, part-time, or full-time job opening. The staff will help you find a hard-working student. If your company hires interns, have the internships listed in the career center. Join the campus career center鈥檚 career advisory network and use your 鈥渞eal world鈥� experience to advise students of their career options.