On Sept. 18, Hopkins students and employers gathered in the Ralph S. O’Connor Center for Recreation and Well-Being for one of the keystones of the Life Design Lab’s sixth annual Future Fest: the Consulting, Health, Finance and Social Impact Career Fair.
36 employers, split between the finance and consulting, health care and research, and social impact industries, presented opportunities best aligned with Krieger School of Arts and Sciences (KSAS) students.
The fair was built on several events offered by the Life Design Lab during Future Fest, which were intended to both propel students in their careers as well as encourage them to explore all paths available. Specifically, “Prepare for the Fair” events were held Wednesday and Thursday as part of the lab’s efforts to prepare students for the variety of networking opportunities offered in-person at the fair. Students were able to meet with employers, discuss their interests and career aspirations, link with companies on Handshake to build a lasting connections, and learn about the missions of companies, as well as opportunities with employers interested in Hopkins talent.
Students appreciated the organization of the fair and the departmental divisions that the career fair has implemented in recent years. Shrey Soni, a master’s student in the Carey Business School’s Business Analytics and Artificial Intelligence program, described in an interview with The News-Letter how the fair differed from similar events he’d been to and why he appreciated the design.
“I’ve been to a career fair in Washington, D.C., and it was really good, but I think that this one is on a larger scale. There are a lot of companies, and... segmenting [employer] genres into different departments definitely helps [with] short-listing our companies,” Soni explained.
Aside from the industry stratification of employers, students also found the in-person connections that were offered at the fair to be enriching, especially compared to other platforms commonly used in career networking and searching. In an interview with The News-Letter, Knox Schlossberg, a masters student in the KSAS Advanced Academic Programs’ Global Security Studies program, elaborated on the distinction between online and in-person networking.
“One thing I do like is the chance to meet as many employers as [the fair offers]... Sure, we have stuff like LinkedIn and Handshake that... [help] out a lot, but I think having an in-person conversation with the actual people behind the company tends to go... a long way,” Schlossberg said.
Attendees did, however, express some desire for a wider diversity of opportunities than the career fair presented. Mytreyi Abburu, a master’s student in KSAS Advanced Academic Programs’ Bioinformatics program, said in an interview with The News-Letter that she hopes to see career fair opportunities grow and change as the working world transforms.
“The degree is one thing, but what you want to do exactly with the degree, whether it be opening up a company or a startup... there's multiple options, right? So more of that awareness, I feel, needs to come, as well as how we can tie in these companies with education, how we can impact education and how we can transform education to make it more engaging for people,” Abburu said.
Abburu then suggested that the career-based learning opportunities should expand to encompass newly emerging fields such as the startup industry. In his interview with The News-Letter, Soni echoed this suggestion.
“Adding newer companies and maybe including startups [when] collaborating with new students would be beneficial,” he said.
