Delta Epsilon Iota Welcome Back Party
featuring a concert by Elevation!
As a Career Advisor, I love hearing stories about how professionals ended up in their chosen fields.
I recently met a woman who majored in biology, married her college sweetheart, and five years later is managing her mother-in-law’s independent bookstore on a small island in Washington. During a long airport layover, I chatted with a group of guys who years before had lived in the same freshman hall. They majored in various fields yet shared a love for adventure and sustainability, and moved to Honduras as a group to start a non-profit. One of my mentors studied physics, and then founded an award-winning expedition company.
There’s a pattern here: Frequently, people end up working in fields that are only tangentially related (or even totally unrelated!) to their undergraduate degree. Does this mean people should skip college entirely, since it might not directly relate to a professional future? Hardly.
College teaches an impressive set of transferable skills, which can be applied in any profession. All of the rigorous majors at NAU develop abilities in researching, writing, communication, working in teams, and self-management…all of which are listed in the top 10 skills employers seek in new hires[1]. So, even if you don’t know the field you want to be working in, it’s a safe bet that you’ll be applying transferable skills like these no matter where you end up. You can start building a professional resume now by getting engaged on campus in positions that give you hands-on experience to develop these skills.
Delta Epsilon Iota is an honors society that educates members about career development. We host events throughout the semester….and we’re recruiting! If you’d like to develop some transferable skills while being part of an awesome student group, consider looking into the organization here. We need students to plan events, facilitate workshops, manage communications, and help with many other interesting projects. Please send me an email at Laurah.Hagen@nau.edu if you’d like to learn more, or stop by the DEI table at the Career Fair on October 9th in the Health and Learning Center.