Career connections through area’s Consortium of 6 colleges

Around this time of year, nearly 3,000 emerging leaders graduate from the colleges of our regional Consortium: New College of Florida, Ringling College of Art and Design, State College of Florida, Manatee-Sarasota, the University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee, FSU/The Ringling, and Eckerd College.

But our job as educators isn’t over when they receive that diploma. Although going to college is not just about finding a job, finding a career in the graduate’s field of interest is the next logical step. Individually, each member of the Consortium strives day in and day out to prepare our students for a lifetime of career success. By working together, we are planning to provide access to our combined resources to help students make the leap to becoming a working professional.

At Ringling College, we know the critical role that creative artists and designers play in the global economy, so we do everything we can to build networks for our students and showcase their extraordinary talent. We develop students’ critical thinking and technical skills through a rigorous curriculum, supplemented by experiential learning programs such as our Collaboratory, an initiative developed by Ringling College in partnership with The Patterson Foundation, our award-winning ART Network and Design Center, the Ringling College Studio Lab co-founded with Semkhor Productions, and — of course — our Center for Career Services.

Through the Ringling College Center for Career Services, students can earn credits through tailored internships, and every year, some 90 top creative businesses and brands in the world visit our campus to deliver presentations, meet emerging talented artists and designers, and review portfolios. Students have met with recruiters from giants in the art, design, and technology industries, including American Greetings, Disney, DreamWorks, Google, Hallmark, Hasbro, Pixar and Wieden+Kennedy, to name a few.

We encourage students from the beginning of their freshman year to visit Career Services, get counseling about career opportunities, and go to the presentations of all the recruiters. Starting from the moment a student enrolls to when they graduate is an important part of career advising. Plus, our career services operation is available for the remainder of the alumni’s life. So if circumstances change, we are there for them no matter how long ago they graduated from Ringling College.

To demonstrate the importance of these connections, a recent graduate of our Advertising Design program was personally invited to apply for a position as a copywriter after a recruiter from ChappellRoberts saw her work on campus. She got the job—and began working a month after graduation. This is the value of having employers come to the region. Our students and graduates become real, and their work can speak for itself.

And this importance placed on career guidance is a perspective shared by all members of the Consortium.

Fellow Consortium member University of South Florida Sarasota-Manatee recently launched its new “Career Success Advising Model” to personalize and prioritize the student transition to a meaningful career. The University has redesigned its advising model into three tiers that take students from course selection to career choices and preparation. The three tiers of advising include: Introductory Advisors, Career Advisors, and Specialist Advisors. This approach involves bringing in industry professionals to serve as career advisors and advisory specialists, marking an increased awareness of the career-centric mindset of this generation of students.

New College’s Center for Engagement and Opportunity focuses students in a variety of post-graduate success areas. Beyond career exploration, the Center also advises students on national fellowships, internships and community engagement, for a 360-view of life after college. Aimed at graduating seniors, the Center’s Job Quest program is a step-by-step semester-long workshop series on how to complete a professional, polished job search, with participants learning valuable skills like career mapping, utilizing social networks, and exploring the “hidden” job market.

The Career Resource Center at State College of Florida, Manatee-Sarasota (SCF), offers students career development resources that help guide students on their journey to a successful career. SCF starts at the beginning of a student’s education, making a career coach available to each student to help them choose a major based on interests, values, and personality types. The coaches work with students to explore careers, including salaries, job markets, and education requirements and finally they help students chart their educational course in meeting those career goals.

The Career Resource Center also helps students find internships and on-campus employment while they are attending SCF and provides a local job postings list when they are ready to start their job hunt. The center also helps students write and design cover letters, résumés, and portfolios – both digital and print – targeted at the careers they have chosen.

As you can see, our individual organizations have distinct approaches to preparing students and alumni, but together our efforts to aid our students and graduates are amplified. Through the Consortium, various departments from our institutions, including our Career Services departments, have begun to collaborate for the betterment of our collective graduates and for the community.

Representatives from each College and University meet on a regular basis to share resources, plan initiatives, and learn how to complement and supplement our efforts. We have the same goals: to get our students graduated and find a meaningful career. To do that, we try to make it easy for recruiters and employers to hire them.

So our dedicated teams seek out and highlight what we have in common, what is working on our respective campuses, and how we can target and expand our approach to help employers right here in Sarasota-Manatee and those across the country and the world to find our talented students and alumni.

I believe the success of our collective mission depends not only providing an education of uncompromising quality, but also expert career advice, leadership in experiential education, current information and resources, and networking opportunities on and off campus. And this alliance of schools only elevates this mission. Together, we provide more encompassing, efficient, and thoughtful services, initiatives and opportunities with the goal of guiding our students to a lifetime of success.

This story was originally published April 7, 2017 at 5:41 PM with the headline "Career connections through area’s Consortium of 6 colleges."