Cal Poly Slo

Throughout the pandemic many have often found it difficult to find opportunities to enhance their professional skills. The Cal Poly SLO Chapter of WSS recently hosted a Job Application and Interview Workshop with career services at their school to help their members stay up to date with the best ways to prepare for any job applications. This was a great way to engage their members in collectively preparing for their futures and learn important life skills together!
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This event was designed by the executive board at Cal Poly SLO to educate their members about the best ways to represent themselves when applying for jobs and internships. The event was planned by their executive board, who worked closely with career services at their school to make the event as informative as possible. The executive board collectively decided that during a pandemic it was even more crucial to put on a job application and interview workshop, so their members would be best equipped when entering the job market after graduation. Their Events Coordinator, Lia Roccucci, coordinated the workshop with career services and made sure her executive board had extensive information on how they could best make the event flow. Lily Holzner, who works for career services at Cal Poly, was kind enough to create a presentation for the event and helped the executive board facilitate the event.
At the event members learned valuable tips including: doing quality research about the job responsibilities beforehand, having an effective resume and cover letter, and how to perform well in interviews. Career services provided the Chapter with a presentation that broke down useful application strategies and gave examples for resumes, cover letters and references. The event provided their members with the opportunity to ask questions and share their own experiences with applying for jobs. The workshop was conducted over Zoom and the executive board made sure to send all presentation slides and resources with all attendees and members who could not make the event.
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The Cal Poly Chapter of WSS always makes a point of putting on events like these around Fall and Winter when many people are applying for Summer internships. This best prepares their members for the internship and job application cycle at those specific times of the school year. This event was very successful because of the quality interactions members had with the career servies professionals who were able to speak more specifically to each person through having a smaller group to present to. In the future with a larger turnout, the executive board is planning to have breakout rooms for mini-discussions during the presentation, so members can best process the information they receive.
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The executive board at Cal Poly was thrilled to receive great feedback on their event! Maddie Schleinitz, a member of the Cal Poly WSS Chapter, said the interview workshop helped her significantly with feeling prepared and confident when applying and interviewing for internships over the summer, which can often be an intimidating process. Their Events Coordinator Lia Roccucci said the best part of the workshop for her was learning how to tailor her cover letter and resume, and being directly connected to resources to use as a guide to improve their job applications.
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Putting on successful events over Zoom can be a challenge for many organizations. The Women in Science Society is proud of all of our Chapters who amaze us everyday with their creativity in finding the best ways to provide quality experiences for their members. We are especially proud of our Cal Poly SLO Chapter for their very successful event and look forward to seeing all the great events they will continue to put on throughout the quarter!