Two students in front of the ambitions board

March 17, 2015, by Oyku Ataman

Careers and employability on the road!

By Oyku Ataman, student blogger

This week the Careers and Employability Service are out and about with their Careers Roadshow at popular sites across the University. Yesterday they were in front of the George Green Library, and if you walked past there, there’s no way you could have missed them because they had a bright pink gazebo!

When I went there I was warmly greeted and asked about my plans after university. To be honest, I don’t have any concrete plans yet but writing that I wanted to teach English in a foreign country of my choice onto a laminated wish bubble in my not so attractive handwriting was extremely satisfying!

These bubbles are there for you to write down your dreams after university regardless of what they are. Then they are pinned on the board set up behind the stand. These were good fun to read. My personal favourite said “Pilot! I want to fly!” which you can see if you look very hard at the photo on the left.

Ask the advisers

Although this event was created with a focus on 2015 graduates, students from all years and even research staff were showing up to take advantage of the advisers on hand. I asked some of the students how beneficial they found the event . Here is some of the feedback.

First year student commented:

“I found out the dates for the next internship fair and that was really helpful!”

A second year electronic communications student said:

“I want to join a telecommunications agency and they gave me some contact details, and that was great.”

A fourth year pharmacy student, who wished to transfer to medicine after he graduates, said:

“Yeah, it was very useful! Got a few contact details and more information about how I can go about it”

There’s something for everyone; I found out that each faculty has its own specialist careers team and at this event there were faculty team members from engineering and medicine and health care – all with plenty of  knowledge of the many options available.

Hundred and thousands of vacancies

‘Hundreds and thousands  of vacancies’ was the message on the bag of jazzies (chocolate buttons covered with hundreds and thousands!) referring to the graduate and internship vacancies advertised on My Career. Talk to the team at the Roadshow and get your free bag of sweets.

Another cool promotion during the week is if  you tweet your dream job to #UoNgrads2015, you might win a prize for the best tweet each day! Better yet, you may end up winning the prize of the week which will be a £10 Sainsbury’s gift voucher!

It will also be interesting to hear what everyone else is saying – I tend to assume everyone else has it figured out but me (it really does feel this way in my circle) so I can put that to the test.

They will be in the following places for the rest of the week between 12-2pm:

  • Tuesday – James Cameron-Gifford Library, Sutton Bonington
  • Wednesday – Portland Building, University Park
  • Thursday – Hallward Library, University Park
  • Friday – Djanogly Learning Resource Centre, Jubilee

So if you have any queries, problems or anxieties or you just want some chocolate and a chat, you know where to go!

If you can’t get to the Careers Roadshow, you can talk to a member of staff anytime – have a look at our faculty team pages  – or message us on Facebook and Twitter. Also check out our website – we’ve got it covered from help generating career ideas to making applications!

Posted in Careers AdvicePostgraduate Taught Students