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Big Changes at Career Center
ORU responds to alumni concerns
By Laura B. Raphael
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In fact, let us count just four ways CCGC has improved in the past few years...
1) Better strength and career assessment
Previously, career guidance at ORU could be a scattershot experience, in part because it lacked a centralized tool to effectively assess a student's strengths, skills, and experiences. Today, College and Career Guidance Center director John Brown proudly points to the central piece of his office's comprehensive "early intervention" approach, used at ORU since early 2001: a scientifically validated, biblically based, and impressively complete computer assessment program developed by Christian Financial Concepts and University of Georgia researchers.
The test takes 45 minutes to an hour to complete, and students are left with a 35-page report and the tools to determine the next steps in choosing viable career paths and, in some cases, a plan of study.
2) More--and more targeted--services
"Dizzying" best describes the number and variety of services that CCGC gives both students and alumni. In addition to the aforementioned assessment test (yes, alumni can take the test, too), Brown lists workshops on multiple topics such as résumé preparation and interviewing skills, and one-on-one sessions with students dedicated to career exploration as well as job searches, career and job fairs, job shadowing, internship offerings, and graduate school preparation as part of the CCGC repertoire.
One exciting difference this year is the addition of targeted presentations by CCGC staff to different student organizations. This allows Brown and others to give very specific career advice and inform students of career tools and opportunities geared toward their particular interest. It's been an effective strategy, Brown says, one that helps students find the resources they need for their future working lives.
3) Expanded employer recruitment
While ORU cannot launch and sustain the kind of massive employer recruitment effort that a much larger university like Oklahoma State University can, Brown and his staff are tireless in their efforts to educate companies about the high quality of ORU students. Chamber of Commerce meetings, business conferences, even fellowship times after church services are all fertile opportunities for Brown and the CCGC staff to network, find out about job openings, and offer to introduce qualified job applicants.
"As a former businessman and manager, I understand how difficult it can be to hire the right employees, ones who will do the job well and be satisfied enough to stay for longer than a year or two. I tell businesses that ORU is like a very, very well-stocked pond of top-quality fish. Sure, you may find a larger number of fish in the ocean, but it's much easier to come here and find, well, better fish!" Brown says, laughing at his unconventional-if appropriate-metaphor.
4) Increased alumni opportunities
Alumni now have many more opportunities to both help--and be helped by--CCGC.
On the "be helped" side, out-of-work or curious alumni are welcome to take the career assessment test, get help in planning a job search, attend regularly scheduled workshops, or even have their résumés reviewed. Additionally, if alumni are looking for mature, ethical, hardworking employees to hire, CCGC is happy to pre-screen and pre-qualify job candidates from their bank of ORU students and alumni.
Furthermore, a number of CCGC-moderated message boards will soon be available for alumni at http://alumni.oru.edu. Alumni will be able to inquire about job openings in other locations, post new positions, or help each other with career-related questions.
And how can alumni help current students and fellow ORU graduates? By working with CCGC in everything from becoming a mentor to passing on internal contacts who might be hiring within the companies where they work. "We have many alumni who work for Fortune 500 or Fortune 1,000 companies. If they would just give me the name of someone they know in Human Resources, I will bend over backwards to make contact with them and connect them to excellent job candidates," Brown says. "For so many jobs, all it takes is an edge like that."
Results: "In the realm of the miraculous"
So things are now different in ORU's College and Career Guidance Center. So what? Show us the results!
One measure that things are, indeed, different--and more importantly, better--is the increase in students using CCGC. As they begin to hear about their fellow students' positive experiences with CCGC, more and more students are signing up for individualized help and counseling. In Brown's first year as director (when the changes were first starting to be implemented), about 200 students came to the offices for career help. The second year, that number reached 800, and last year it climbed to 1,200--six times higher than the first year. This year, if the numbers continue as Brown thinks they will, CCGC will have helped between 1,500 and 1,700 students, something he characterizes as "in the realm of the miraculous."
For more information about the College and Career Guidance Center, please go to http://careers.oru.edu or call CCGC at (918) 495-6912. (The Career Information Line is [918] 495-7075.) CCGC is located on the sixth floor of the Learning Resources Center and is open Monday through Friday, 8 a.m. to 5 p.m.
