Episode 34: Preparing for Your Dream Job While in High School

Episode 34 Transcript

• Episode 34 Transcript

  EPISODE 34

  [00:00:07] BW: When do you find the one? For many of us, we didn't pinpoint our perfect career path until midway through college. For others, that true passion waited to reveal itself after years of being in the workforce. But for a lucky few, that dream job shines brightly early on. These ambitious high schoolers are certain what they want to do with their degrees before they even begin their college search.

  [00:00:32] BT: This episode is for that last group, the high schoolers who are charting paths to their dream jobs as we speak. I'm Brooke Thames from Bucknell University, and today on College Admissions Insider, we'll provide some tips to guide those students as they lay the groundwork for their future success.

  [00:00:48] BW: And I'm Bryan Wendell, also from Bucknell. To help us discuss everything from how to evaluate colleges based on your career goals to gaining practical job experience while in high school, we've invited an expert guest to join us on today's episode. That guest is Pamela Keiser, the executive director of career services at Bucknell’s Center for Career Advancement. Pam has been at Bucknell for more than 25 years, serving in a variety of roles — career coach, educational programming and employer relations, all in the career center. And she has served as executive director of the career center since 2011. We should also mention, she's the proud parent of a Bucknellian from the class of 2021. Welcome to the podcast, Pam.

  [00:01:28] PK: Thank you. Thank you for having me today. It's a pleasure to join you both.

  [00:01:32] BT: Yeah, and so to start off our conversation here, I wonder, how often do you hear from high school students? And are there any common questions that you received from them about career planning as it relates to their college education?

  [00:01:47] PK: Sure, sure. It's a great question. We do hear from students from time to time, and prospective families as well. We’ll work with the athletic coaching staffs if they're bringing recruits in to visit campus, and also with the various admissions programs that are out there.

  Oftentimes, families will stop by or students will reach out by email with questions, and they usually center around a couple of things. With the cost of education, obviously people are concerned about what is my return on investment? And they should be asking that question. Certainly, it's fair game to ask questions about outcomes. Where do Bucknell grads go? As well as any college or university that you're looking at. So you should know that all colleges should be able to provide outcome information. Sometimes it's called a postgraduate report of activity — that's what we call ours. Sometimes it's known as a first destination survey or first destination report. But basically, you should be able to take a look at where, in general, graduates go. So our Bucknell grads, where are they landing in that first destination post-graduation? And what type of work are they doing? What are they pursuing with their first step out? Or what graduate or professional school are they currently enrolled in? Or are they volunteering and spending time perhaps in a service category? Working for the military full-time? There's a couple of different options that graduates can go into. But that information should be available to you.

  And if you research it, you should be able to drill down a bit deeper and look by college. At Bucknell, we have three obviously: Management, Engineering in Arts & Sciences. And you can drill even a layer further into major. And it's really important that you do that just to get a sense of what might my experience be at Bucknell, and how might I utilize my time during my four years of undergraduate education?

  [00:03:42] BW: One big takeaway I have from what you just said is that you are an expert on this and are willing to take questions from prospective students and families. So they shouldn't be afraid to get in touch with you.

  [00:03:51] PK: Not at all.

  [00:03:53] BW: That's so great to hear. And I imagine some students in high school are laser-focused on what they want to do with their career after college. Maybe they've wanted to be an engineer ever since they first got their Lego set at age six. How do you advise them to go about searching for colleges and choosing a major? And also, are you telling them, “Hey, you might want to plan B or plan C career plan,” as well?

  [00:04:15] PK: Sure. Well, I'm a firm believer, it never hurts to have a plan B in your back pocket just in case, because you never know what curves life may throw to you. But for a high schooler, I think it's important to evaluate what career centers are offering in regards to your undergrad experience. So are they offering one on one assistance? Are there an abundance of programs that will allow you to explore career paths? Will there be opportunities to connect with alumni for networking purposes? Perhaps parents, definitely employers, and what sort of employer events are they offering? So it's really important, no matter what type of career path you're thinking about, that you do a little bit of homework there and compare and evaluate colleges from the career center perspective.

  If you're really laser-focused and zeroed in on a particular area, then the postgrad survey that I mentioned earlier, that's a great place to take a look at. What have the most recent graduates pursued? Where did they land immediately after graduation? There are some other reports that we host on our website, which would tell you a more snapshot perspective of where are our English majors, or our engineering majors, or our biology majors. So look for that information. And if you can't find it, certainly ask and be thinking about, “How might I use my time most wisely when I first begin my time at Bucknell,” or the institution of your choice?

  The other thing is to think about your plan B question. You never know for sure just how you personally or individually will react to your coursework. You're coming into college fresh out of high school. It is a different experience. There are different expectations academically for what you should be producing within the classroom. And you may have thought since the age of five or six that you've been playing with Legos, and that you would pursue a career in civil engineering, let's say. Or your family has always encouraged you to be a doctor or a lawyer someday. But then you might step inside that first chemistry course or statistics and realize, “This isn't quite what I thought it was going to be.” And it could be either that you're struggling with the material or that you aren't enjoying the material and learning about it even though you might do quite well in the classroom grade-wise. That's where the plan B can come in handy because you just never know what else you might learn about, or be a part of at college that suddenly opens up a whole new door or a window for you that was never on your radar screen. So that's why plan B's or plan C's can sometimes be helpful.

  [00:06:53] BT: Yeah, college is definitely a place for exploration, especially liberal arts colleges like Bucknell.

  [00:06:59] PK: One other thing, if I can add to that, is something that's really important for high school students to think about is not all careers require a particular major. It's really important to share that today. Of course, if you're an engineer, you need an engineering background. If you want to be an accountant, an accounting major is the way you should go. But for so many other careers that are out there, you can major, double-major, major and minor in a wide variety of areas and be successful.

  So for example, econ majors can pursue investment banking in addition to being a management major out of our College of Management. And students that are thinking about med school, of course if you're majoring in the sciences, that's a clear path. But we've had engineers and English majors apply to med school, and simply all they've had to do is work with our pre-health advisor and make sure that they're meeting all the pre-requirements from a coursework perspective. So don't think linearly that a certain major always leads to a particular career path. What's important is that you're studying something that you will enjoy studying, and hopefully that translates to you doing well in the classroom, which will lead to a strong GPA, which makes you very competitive in whatever industry, or graduate school, or professional school program that you pursue. But just really important to keep that in mind. Not all career paths require one particular major.

  [00:08:26] BT: Yeah, the possibilities there can really be limitless, which brings up the students who are at the opposite end of that spectrum who maybe are juggling a whole bunch of options in terms of colleges and majors. And so I wonder how would you kind of advise them if they don't know what they want to do for a career path? How should they evaluate colleges and majors from that planning perspective?

  [00:08:47] PK: Absolutely. So think about what sort of choices you will have? What sort of options will you have? What is the core curriculum requirement for the undergraduate institution, and how might that expose you to different areas of the university? So if you're really not sure, maybe have a couple of ideas but you just wouldn't want to commit to anything, what harm is there in taking some humanities, some social sciences, some physical sciences, maybe an intro to management course, or an art course? You could go in so many different directions.

  But while you're doing that, hopefully, you're also ticking off some boxes that help you meet the requirements for the core curriculum requirements at Bucknell. And then that way, you can chip away at the basic foundation of your undergrad education, but also be in the classroom with a number of different faculty studying a number of different subjects, and hopefully one's going to click with you. So you might have never thought of a psychology major, for example, yet you took Psych 101. And suddenly it clicked, and you thought, “This is fascinating. I want to learn more.” And it might lead to a major in psychology, which can take you in a variety of different directions from a career pursuit angle.

  [00:10:01] BW: We've talked a lot about on this podcast the advantages of liberal arts schools and small schools like Bucknell. There's the lower student-faculty ratio, the smaller class sizes. But I wonder how that comes into play with a career center? And are there advantages to a smaller school when it comes to an office like yours at the Center for Career Advancement?

  [00:10:22] PK: Well, I have to confess, I might be a little biased on this given that my career has been within a private liberal arts institution. But I do think so. I think there is a real advantage. Bucknell being a smaller school, our coach-to-student ratio — as students might compare faculty-to-student ratios in the classroom — our career coach-to-student ratio is a bit better than large institutions. We work one-on-one with many students on a regular basis. So setting up an appointment with a coach and working through what your challenges or what your interests are and recognizing how we may be able to be helpful to you — that's something that happens every day in the career center. We also offer a number of programs that are group-oriented, field trips to employers, career fairs that are open to all students.

  But yet there are some niche areas within our office as well. Pre-law and pre-health advising fall within our office. We have one staff person designated for each of those areas. We also have a number of programs specific to class years. Our sophomore externship program, for example, zeroes in on the sophomore job shadow experience. Our annual winter brunch for the sophomore class is something that we cohost every year with our alumni board, and it's an opportunity for sophomore students to meet and connect with Bucknell Alumni Board members. And I could carry that forward for many other opportunities.

  But you really get the opportunity to connect with people. Work with us to the level that you want because, let's face it, there may be some students that don't need quite as much help from us as others. And that's, I think, another nice blend of private liberal arts institutions — students get to make their choices and own their decisions about how involved and active they will be with the career center. And you just need to realize that you want to be aware all four years of your time at a university what is offered when and when typical employers come to recruit for internship opportunities and fulltime opportunities. Because the one thing I hate to hear is when students might say, “Oh, I didn't know about that.” Or it's a once-a-year opportunity, and they came in a month after that opportunity happened or that internship deadline hit. So that's why it's important to be engaged and aware and own your activity and your decisions, just as you do in the classroom.

  [00:12:47] BT: Yeah, and one of the things that colleges often provide is some information on outcomes to help students evaluate that return on investment that you've mentioned before. And that can come in a print piece or posted on the website and include career placement rates, average salaries, and even lists of companies where graduates work. And some of that can include not only a lot of numbers, but some marketing and also some jargony language. And so I wonder, is there anything more to unpack there? Some quick tips to help students cut through some of that to see where a school really stands?

  [00:13:19] PK: Absolutely. I think one of the best pieces of advice is to talk with people — to either pick up the phone or shoot an email if you can find an email address for a faculty member that may spend time in your academic department of interest to you, or to reach out to the career center and have a conversation with a coach. If you're on campus, making sure you're taking a tour and seeing all that the university has to offer. Attend the admissions events. But be an active researcher on this project to make sure that you've done your homework and that you know all you can about the university before you make your decision on where you will be attending. That's really important.

  Don't be shy. People should respond to your email promptly, or pick up the phone and return your call if they get a voicemail message from you. I would just encourage students be very proactive about asking questions and learning all they can about the universities they're considering. Because it's all going to translate in what opportunities will you have available, and how can you make the most of your time at that institution — hopefully, Bucknell, but at any institution.

  [00:14:28] BW: And you talked about networking earlier at those brunches and other events and activities. But those are, of course, for current college students. But what about a high school student who wants to start networking? They're really ambitious, a go-getter, and they want to start making those connections now as they're listening to this. First of all, is that a good idea? Is it too early? And secondly, how would they go about doing that?

  [00:14:53] PK: Sure. It's a great question. Yes, I think put yourself out there a bit and take some risks. Be reasonable about it, certainly. You're a high school student, you're involved, I'm assuming, in a number of different activities. And, of course, grades still matter, and you're putting together your applications. But if you're truly interested in a particular university…And at a place like Bucknell, our alumni are very accessible. So you could ask a guidance counselor who may have chosen to attend Bucknell in recent years. They may be able to rattle off a couple of names for you. You could then look them up on LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a wonderful research tool, and it's a great way to connect and engage with people. So you could reach out on LinkedIn and see if your guidance counselor may give you a particular name of a person. You could research that by name in a keyword search with also the word Bucknell and see if you're able to find them.

  Or in general, you could search by Bucknell in a keyword search or go to our university page on LinkedIn and be able to start digging into the layers of LinkedIn to see if you can find some Bucknell alums that are perhaps doing the type of work or pursuing the type of career path that you're most interested in. Maybe they are in your local area, maybe they're not. But these days, you can reach out to people just about anywhere, and let them know, “Hey, I'm a high school senior. I'm very seriously interested in Bucknell. I was doing a little bit of work on LinkedIn and came across your name. Would you be able to have a short conversation with me so that I could learn a bit about your experience at Bucknell and see what tips or advice you might have to offer to me?” Or you could ask them about their career path and how they got to where they are today from their time and their days at Bucknell.

  [00:16:44] BT: The Internet can be a really great tool in that way. And speaking of tools, shifting gears a little bit to talk about students who are building the foundation for their future careers right now. I wonder, what can they do to gain practical experience and tools that they can then later use in college and beyond?

  [00:17:01] PK: Certainly. I mean, the world works by skill set. So thinking about whether you're in high school, or whether you're starting out in your college careers, thinking about doing a short self-assessment or reflection on who you individually are. What are your talents? What are your strengths? What might be gap areas or weaknesses? We all have them. So you shouldn't feel badly if you say, “I'm not the best public speaker, but I'm really great at solving problems.” But thinking about how are you using your time, and where are you engaged in invested in high school? And what skills, what experiences are you developing through those commitments that you have? And is there an experience that might help you to develop something that might not be your sweet spot or your strong point that could help you to work on a particular area?

  But also recognizing, in high school, you have lots of time ahead of yourself. So again, I say be reasonable, because we only have so many hours in a day. At Bucknell and at any other college, we want you to enjoy your high school experience for what it is and not be so focused on the future that you forget about the present time that you're currently in and making the most of that. But if you just sit back and think a little bit about, “What are my skills? What are my interests? What's important to me as a person? How am I using my time? And what might I want to learn more about?” That might be a quick way to assess and analyze, “What else might I want to do? Where else should I spend my time?” And then pick and choose what's most important to you.

  I'd recommend that same advice to a first-year student coming into Bucknell. You don't need to belong to 12 clubs. You might want to reach out and join three or four. And maybe even three or four is too much with what you're also juggling in learning how to know what expectations your faculty have for you in the classroom. So maybe you start out by just joining one or two organizations, and then you learn a little bit more about a couple of other clubs or volunteer organizations, and you build upon that. You don't have to jump into the deep end of the pool, if you will, that very first semester that you're in college. You can build upon your experiences. And it's more important that you're involved in a few organizations that you feel very vested in and committed to and take on a leadership role or a committed role, helping to move a mission or a service forward through that organization versus being in a ton of them. You might be a member, but maybe you aren't vested and passionate about being in that organization. Does that make sense?

  [00:19:39] BW: I think it does. And I'm really glad you said something about balance because that's so important. I can imagine there's some people out there — a high school junior high school senior — saying, “Wait a second, talking about my career after college? I'm just trying to finish high school here and get through all that I'm doing.” I mean, let's talk a little bit more about how to maintain that balance and not have too much tunnel vision and say, “I'm so focused on getting this exact career that I'm not focusing on the demands of the day-to-day high school life.”

  [00:20:10] PK: Certainly, it's good to make plans. And it's good to have dreams, and goals, and ambitions. And I would not discourage any high school student to not think about that. But you also have to realize that the world can change on a dime. We just have experienced that in March of 2020 when the COVID pandemic hit us. Who would have thought that we would have lived through the last year and a half or more that we have, and it continues?

  And COVID affected lots of us in lots of different ways. Some industries were really challenged and turned upside down and some industries thrived. And who would have predicted that just even 18 months ago? So there were some organizations, some companies, some corporations that really had to lay people off. Suddenly, people weren't able to work. Look at the hospitality industry, for example. And not just restaurants, but thinking about the hotel industry and event planners that plan large national conferences, those types of things. People, really, their world was turned upside down, and they might not have even had the opportunity to work for a period of time. And I don't say that to panic anyone or to cause anxiety, but you just never know when those curveballs are going to come.

  So that's, again, going back to one of our first questions — a plan B or a plan C. You need to be adaptable. And you need, of course, to be laser-focused on something, but also be ready and know that life can change. And if you're an adaptable or a flexible person, you can change with the times and know that you have a lot of talents, a lot of skills, a lot of abilities to offer. That's one of the values of a liberal arts education. You're getting a broad education, and then you're taking a deep dive into particular areas of our curriculum. But it really does give you the thought process, the problem-solving skills, the communication skills, the thinking skills to be able to look at the situation that you're facing — however large or small it may be — and then adapt and successfully move forward in a way that's right for you.

  [00:22:21] BT: Yeah. Those are great things to keep in mind as you enter into this kind of new phase of life in college, where there's so many opportunities but also unknowns there that students are going to have to navigate. And, I guess, speaking of students and navigating that college journey, I wonder if we can end this episode talking about maybe a student's story or two. I know that you have led career panels on Admitted Student Day where Bucknell students share stories of how they've used their time here to secure those practical experiences that we had talked about. And so do you have a favorite example of a senior who had a really great Bucknell experience that they then translated into a career?

  [00:22:58] PK: There are two recent grads that come to mind. One is a young woman who worked in our office as an intern in the career center, so I knew her quite well. She was always intrigued by the world of communications, but she was also juggling that with an interest in politics. And so she interned at The Today Show between her first and second year at Bucknell. So she spent time inside of a large media organization interning. Then the year following, she interned on Capitol Hill, so she got to see and experience life in DC. This was all pre-COVID, of course. And then her summer between junior and senior year, she had the good fortune to intern at Good Morning America. And she loved her experience at Good Morning America. She graduated during the pandemic and realized that things might not happen as quickly as they sometimes do because of the opportunities that were and were not available. She took another job for a year in, I believe, it was marketing research. And now she is involved in production with Good Morning America.

  So she's back at the place that she set her sights on and she took full advantage of her internship experiences. She worked her way through, “Do I want to do communications and media work? Or what about politics in Capitol Hill?” Got experiences in both areas, and that helped her to make a decision. And she also took advantage of being involved on campus in a number of different ways and working in our office. So she really had the full profile coming from a liberal arts undergrad and a liberal arts major within that liberal arts undergraduate institution. And today, she's in New York working for Good Morning America and pursuing her dreams.

  [00:24:49] BW: That's so great.

  [00:24:50] PK: Another example to give you is of a graduate just this past year. She was the laser-focused example. She came to us as a first-year student, walked in our doors at the Career Center within the first couple of weeks of school, met with our coach who focused on finance careers, and really got down to business knowing that investment banking was her goal. She had thought about it for a long time, and she made the most of every moment she had at Bucknell. She interned at Goldman Sachs. She was involved in a program called Girls Can Code. And she was involved in a summer experience at Wharton that focused in on finance careers for undergraduate students. She made the most of her internship at Goldman Sachs and networked with our alumni who were inside Goldman Sachs. And today, she's an investment banking analyst for Goldman.

  So she was the example of someone coming in from the start knowing what she wanted. And her experience helped to reinforce and prepare her for that, nd nothing along the way made her change her mind. She reached her goals. She is where she wanted to be for that first step out post-graduation.

  [00:26:01] BW: That's awesome. Very great examples of exactly what we've been talking about in this episode. I wrote down you something you said earlier because it really stuck with me: “The world works by skill set.” It's really about building as many different skills as you can and having as many different tools in your tool belt as possible. Because I can't help but think that when today's high school students are looking for a career, it's going to be 2026, 2027, 2028, and there's 100% chance that there will be jobs that none of the three of us could ever have even imagined out there. And so, as you said, preparing for those by broadening your skill set is super smart.

  [00:26:39] PK: Right. And really not ruling anything out until you get to college and can experience all that it has to offer you from an academic standpoint, and from the extracurricular activities that you can get involved with. Because it's different from your high school experience, and you really want to sort of take the blinders off and experience it all, and then drill down and start making your decisions so that you don't miss out on anything that you just didn't bother to take the time to think about or experience while you were in your undergrad years.

  [00:27:12] BW: Yeah, that's awesome. And I think that's a great place to end this episode of College Admissions Insider. Pam, thanks so much for joining us and sharing such great advice, and great stories, and insight.

  [00:27:21] PK: Thank you. Thank you. I appreciate the opportunity.

  [00:27:25] BT: And we thank everyone out there for listening. If you enjoy our podcast, please take a moment to rate, subscribe and share this episode with high schoolers that you know who are preparing to take that next step in their college journey.

  [00:27:35] BW: Brooke and I will be back with another new episode in two weeks. In the meantime, please send us questions, comments, concerns, episode ideas, anything you want to podcast@bucknell.edu.

  [00:27:47] BT: And finally, we invite you to follow Bucknell on all of your favorite social media apps. Just look for @ucknelluU on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and now TikTok. You can also follow our student run Instagram account which is @iamraybucknell.

  [00:28:01] BW: Until next time, keep on reaching for your dreams and your dream school.

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