Career Advising for College Students: Working with the Private Sector/Employers
The majority of NCAN member programs interviewed for this project expressed the importance of the student/workforce connection.
Many were either offering workplace learning experiences, such an internships, mentoring/coaching, access to job fairs, professional network-building opportunities, etc. Some members had their own connections with employers, whereas others encouraged
their students to access workplace learning opportunities through their college’s career center. Still other members incorporated labor market and earnings data into their advising services.
The bottom line: Connecting your students to the real-life world of work is an important component of career advising for postsecondary students.
Creating and Sustaining Employer Partnerships
For programs that arrange work-related learning opportunities for the students they advise (separate from those offered through a college's career center,) cultivating and sustaining relationships with the private sector is critical.
Here are some thoughts and suggestions from NCAN members for creating these relationships:
Activate the personal networks of staff and board members to identify new employers with which to partner. Work with employer partners to spread the word too, which can broaden and sustain employer involvement.
Understand why employers are interested in partnerships. Some of these reasons include interest in:
Expanding the pipeline of future employees.
Increasing brand awareness.
Offering community service opportunities to current employees.
Diversifying their workforce.
Ensure employers (and students) have a good experience engaging with your program. This might involve:
Providing an orientation on your program for employers and jointly developing specific goals and expectations for the partnership.
Making sure employers know that with the support and preparation your program provides, your students are uniquely prepared to participate in all work-related activities.
Keeping an open line of communication through regular check-ins with a main point of contact and sending regular email or newsletter updates.
Providing Work-Related Opportunities
The classic work-related learning opportunity for postsecondary students is the internship.
The research is clear: College students who participate in a paid internship during their undergraduate years work in higher-paying jobs a year after graduation, have greater confidence they will be successful in the job market, and are more likely to
believe their education was worth the cost. Some benefits of internships for students include:
On-the-job and/or research experiences.
Opportunities for mentorship.
Exposure to a variety of industries, careers, and job tasks.
An opportunity to build and strengthen their resume.
Professional networking opportunities.
Increasing confidence.
A potential path to a post-graduation job.
Internships have benefits for employers too including:
An opportunity to expose their company and industry more broadly to potential employees.
Reduced risks involved in hiring new employees by offering both themselves and their potential employee a way to assess fit in a lower-pressure environment.
The addition of new perspectives and energy to the workplace.
A broader employee pipeline and candidate pool.
Sadly, women, people of color, first-generation college students, and students from low-income backgrounds are far less likely to secure paid internships.
See below for information on how and why to develop an internship program, as well as more information on the importance of a paid internship experience.
Ideally every college student would have an opportunity for a paid internship. But there are other ways to expose students to career options and work experiences.
Micro-internships are essentially short-term internships that can help students build and demonstrate skills, get real-life career experience, explore career paths, and build their networks. They are generally project-based, not limited
to the summer, and two to four weeks in duration. For employers, micro-internships typically fulfill a specific need and broaden their potential employee pool by extending traditional recruiting efforts beyond the "top" colleges. Parker-Dewey is one of the most popular micro-internship recruiting websites.
Mentoring programs match students with professionals who provide advice and input on career choice and path, resume and cover letters, job searches, career and academic major choice, etc. Mentors who participate with iMentor,
an NCAN member that pioneered the art of online mentoring for college access and success, also provide career advising for their mentees.
Other ways to gain and sustain employer involvement in career advising work include offering job shadowing opportunities or career fairs. Both are lighter-touch services that engage employees and offer career advising
for postsecondary students.
Using Labor Market and Earnings Data in Career Advising Work
Many NCAN members encourage students to examine local and national labor market and earnings trends to help them make informed decisions when choosing a postsecondary institution, major, and potential career.
The good news: Labor market and earnings data at the national, state, and local levels have become more easily accessible.
What tools are available?
The U.S. Census Bureau houses data on the state of the nation's workforce, including employment and unemployment levels within certain geographic areas and industries.
ONet is a one-stop shop with information on jobs, related careers, required knowledge, skills and abilities, required education and credentials, where to get that credential, and a geographic-specific wages
and employment trends feature.
Why and how to use these tools
Using labor market and earnings data in career advising can help students gauge the return on their investment in higher education. This is especially important as college costs continue to rise.
Earnings and labor market data are increasingly accessible through online, user-friendly tools. This information can help students weigh costs of postsecondary education and the debt they might incur with the earning potential of one degree, major, or
credential over another.
It's important for advisers to strike a balance between encouraging students to follow their academic or career passions and focusing solely on potential future earnings.
The role of the adviser is not necessarily to steer students toward in-demand, high-wage jobs, but simply to make them aware of industries with job opportunities and growth potential. Advisers can ensure students are informed about the earnings potential
of any of the career paths they are considering.
NCAN Webinar: "Laying the Groundwork for Engaging Employers and Professionals in Career Advising" – NCAN members share best practices in career advising for college
students, including how to build and maintain strong relationships with employers, working with students to ensure positive work-based learning experiences, and more.
NCAN Blog: "Why and How to Incorporate Earnings Data Into College Access Advising" – Advisers want to make
sure their students are getting the best return possible on their investment in a postsecondary degree. The good news: Earnings data at the national, state, and local levels have become more easily accessible.
NCAN Blog: "Career Advising for College Students: Internship Opportunities for All" – NCAN Member CollegeTracks piloted an initiative to help their students access internships with the assistance of their personal networks. They shared the lessons they learned after completing the pilot year with three partnering organizations.
Other Organizations
Basta: The Basta network includes both students – first-generation college students looking for a job in their field of choice – and employers that are interested in diversifying their workforce. Students
receive support in telling their story, building a professional network, navigating the job search process, and gain access to a support network of peers and advisers. Employers work with Basta throughout the hiring process to, among other
things, reduce selection bias.
Braven: This organization partners with large public universities to build career education into the undergraduate experience for students from low-income backgrounds and those who are first-generation. Braven
offers a credit-bearing course as well as online options that help students hone their resume and cover letter, develop a network of peers and coaches, and develop work-related skills. After the course, students receive ongoing coaching and
have access to employment opportunities available with organizations within the Braven employer network.
National Association of Colleges and Employers: NACE is a membership organization that connects college career services and other staff with business solution providers. The NACE website contains a wealth
of information including employment forecasts, hiring and trends in the job market, starting salaries, recruiting and hiring practices, and identifies best practices and benchmarks. Of particular interest are the NACE competencies for career readiness.
Cleveland State's Internship Toolkit: This practical toolkit prepares employers and internship providers with templates for job descriptions, work plans,
evaluation and feedback forms, as well as best practices for inclusive hiring and how to structure different forms of internships (micro, remote, etc.).
Parker-Dewey platform: Parker-Dewey specializes of offering micro-internships. The organization markets itself to employers as a low-risk way to “audition” talent before making a hiring
decision. They also market themselves to college students as a way to explore different career path, work on interesting projects, and get paid.
Reports and Research
First-Generation Students Underrepresented in Internships: This short piece from NACE covers
findings from a 2019 survey that suggests first-generation students are least likely to have an internship and be paid as an intern in comparison to their non-first-generation peers.
Open the Door: Disparities in Paid Internships: This snapshot of a NACE survey reveals gaps in paid internship
opportunities across race and generation status. Black and Latinx students are more likely to be overrepresented in unpaid internships or not have an internship at all. In addition, first-generation students only made up 19% of paid interns.
The Impact of Unpaid Internships on Career Development: This NACE report reviews outcome gaps in paid and unpaid internships.
The results indicated that unpaid internships do not increase the likelihood of a student getting job offers in the future.
The Power of Work-based Learning: According to a report from the Strada Education Network, participating in a paid internship as an undergraduate is associated with a predicted
increase in annual wages of $3,096 one year after graduation. Work-based learning also was associated with higher career satisfaction.
Unpaid Internships Should be Illegal: Why Colleges Should Reconsider Unpaid Internships:
This blog post creates an argument for why paid internships are critical to ensuring equitable opportunity and offers strategies for college leaders to facilitate access to paid work experiences, especially for historically underserved, low-income,
and racially minoritized student populations.
Additional Resources: Using Labor Market and Earnings Data
Assessments and Tools
Making Use of Labor Market Information: Where to Find Data for Common Community College Decisions:
This guide provides a comprehensive overview on where to find labor market information, how to develop new programs/design curriculum in response to labor market trends, writing grant applications and programs reviews, and much more. While
this guide is geared toward stakeholders in community colleges, this information can be transferrable and relevant to staff at four-year institutions.
My Next Move: This comprehensive, free resource sponsored by the U.S. Department of Labor allows users to:
Search by careers to understand what the job entails, the education required, job outlook, and many other factors about what it “takes” succeed in this career.
Search by industry to understand what types of jobs are available and how to enter and succeed in that career.
Complete the ONet Interest Profiler, which takes users through a series of questions to identify their interests and how they might relate to the world of work.
Adjusting Expectations: The Impact of Labor Market Information on How Undergraduates View Majors and Careers: This case study examines how
sharing labor market information with a diverse student population impacts feelings about choice of major and career intentions. The findings suggest labor market information lowered students' expectations of earnings in some fields and did
not impact student's major choice or sense of job security in the future.
