The SAU Buzz

Issue date: 3/4/10 Section: News

Media Credit: Sam Grossi The Career Center hosted the Resume Drive Thru to give feedback to students on their resumes.

As a part of its commitment to students' success in future job opportunities after college, the St. Ambrose University Career Center conducted a resume drive thru February 15 and16. This was the second time that employers from the Quad City area have been asked to look over students' resumes and give feedback.
Heather Stocking, Career Center counselor, said that there was such a positive response during the first resume drive though in October when Hy-Vee corporate came that they wanted to try again.
"In two days we saw 64 students and that may not sound like a lot but if you break down the Career Center staff hours, in order for us to see 64 students on a resume appointment it would take weeks, if not longer," Stocking said. "So we are meeting the needs of students a lot quicker and a lot more efficiently I think."
This time around employers from the accounting and information technology field of John Deere were present. A representative from the Putnam Museum and IMAX and two members of the Rock Island Arsenal also gave their time to look over resumes.
Stocking believes that these employers can give students a different point of view because they are the professionals who may be hiring the students one day and have been conducting interviews for many years.
"We want students to know that we don't just tell them this stuff because I'm a professional and you're not," Stocking said. "All the advice we give is based on employer feedback. I think it's good that they get some honest feedback. Employers sometimes say 'I would not hire you based on this resume,' which is sometimes a hard thing to hear but I think it's what sometimes people need to hear."
The resume drive thru was also implemented as a way for the Career Center to be more practical.
"Part of the problem with the system before is that some students only need five minutes, and we schedule a half hour to an hour appointment every resume so now I have 55 minutes I could have been meeting with someone else," Stocking said. "Granted I have other work to do, but I'm not being able to serve as many students as I could. At the same time there may be the student that comes to the resume drive through that uses all 15 minutes and still needs to make a follow up appointment at that point we do."
Sarah Brown, a senior elementary education major, took advantage of this opportunity and brought her resume to the drive thru.
"The experience definitely taught me what other employers outside of the education field would want on a resume," Brown said. "It broadened my knowledge of resume formatting styles in case I would need to apply for a job other than one in education."
The career center is focusing now on mock interviews. Some employers that will be conducting interviews for the mock interviews will be from Northwestern Mutual Financial Network, Russell Construction, John Deere, Genesis Health, and Modern Woodmen. Other upcoming events will be the Pro Fair on March 30th and the etiquette dinner.

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