Stevens Students Power Their Futures at Career Day

Over 600 graduating seniors and graduate students at Stevens took advantage of the Class of 2011 Career Day last week, reporting to the Schaefer Athletic and Recreation Center to meet the nearly 100 employers who attended.  Marked by the students’ confidence and knowledge, their own resolution to succeed and their already impressive résumés, the Career Day also exemplified the comprehensive guidance students are given by the Office of Career Development at Stevens. 

Opportunity was knocking on both sides of the door at the event – for students, the chance to connect and discuss post-graduate employment; for the representatives of top companies wanting knowledgeable, highly-skilled, goal-oriented graduates, the occasion to recruit top candidates to meet their greatest business challenges. The conditions were right, as they overwhelmingly are at Stevens. And the result is success. For example, of last year's graduating class, 80 percent accepted offers of employment or enrollment in graduate or professional school programs - and 38% chose from more than one job offer.

For Roque Rios, senior computer engineering major, the Career Day was an opportunity to further enhance the connections he'd made during his IT internship at Colgate. "The face-to-face really helps," he said. "I'm doing what you need to do to make sure your resume gets on the 'good' pile for the jobs you're interested in." His advice to incoming students is to connect with the Office of Career Development early on, well before the various career fairs, and to attend the ongoing career placement workshops and other sessions offered to students. "Because of all the support here, there's really no reason to be lost about job placement at graduation," he said.

L’Oréal Human Resources Manager Terri Dedinski was one of several representatives from the company eager to speak to the Career Day participants. She noted that of the five Stevens students who were chosen for their Operations Internship Program last summer, three were offered permenant positions at the company after graduation. "The partnership with Stevens for internship and career placement has been very successful," she said. "There is a tremendous opportunity for growth for students. Whether during their internships or new employment with the company, their contributions are significant and become part of our ongoing product or process development. And they distinguish themselves on a leadership track that propels them to upper management."

The Career Day also included a luncheon at which employers were recognized for their ongoing support of Stevens students. The Employer of the Year Award was presented to The Bank of Tokyo-Mitsubishi UFJ and accepted by Toshiya Morita, CIO, Systems Office for the Americas, Yawer Fadoo (M.S.`07), Vice President and Manager, Systems Office for the Americas, and Ann Stenson, V.P. of Human Resources. 

Reckitt Benckiser, a consumer products company that hired four Stevens students into research-based summer internships, received the Internship Employer of the Year Award. The students engaged in a variety of projects, from developing new products for the European market to testing antibacterial agents for bar soap. Accepting the award was Will Lenzetti, Global R&D Category Manager.

The Externship Award was given to THE Partnership: NJ Transit and The Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, for providing an outstanding learning experience to Stevens engineering students by coordinating site visits to one of the most exciting construction projects in the area.

The MIT Lincoln Laboratory Scholarship Awards were presented to Phillippe Pierre-Paul and Richard Sanchez.  Phillippe is a junior electrical engineering major pursuing a dual master’s degree in technology management and a minor in pre-law policy.  Richard is a computer engineering major and cooperative education student. The MIT Lincoln Laboratory scholarship was created three years ago and is awarded to two students each year. The director of the Laboratory, in recognition of the nation's critical need to develop more engineers provided scholarship funding to Stevens for these awards.  The recipients are selected on the basis of merit by Dean Deborah Berkley, who directs the Stevens Technical Enrichment Program (STEP).  "It's important to note that these students are not only outstanding students academically, but they are also leaders on campus, and very involved in helping their peers," she said.  

Lynn Insley, Director of the Office of Career Development, expressed how fortunate Stevens is to have longstanding employer relationships that facilitate students' professional development and lead to impressive career outcomes.  "Our students build their success early through internships, cooperative education assignments and research opportunities," she said.  "By the time Stevens students enter their senior year, they are well prepared to engage with recruiting professionals and secure employment opportunities that lead to rewarding careers."

 

Comments

[Undergraduate Admissions]

Thank you ILEAD for your comment! It's exciting that Stevens, indeed, holds more than one career fair per year... in fact, check out the Office of Career Development's web page. Here, you can link to the Career Fair page, which lists the three major fairs http://www.stevens.edu/sit/ocd/ Enjoy!

[ILEAD India]

The Career Day theme was a great idea! The students will surely love to get this type of chance to choose a career. It would also save them time going from one employer to another, as they will have the cream employers under one roof. If it could be held twice a year, it would have been even greater.

[seema]

The MIT Lincoln Laboratory Scholarship Awards were presented to Phillippe Pierre-Paul and Richard Sanchez.