Are you graduating soon or re-entering the job market? The office of Career and Counseling can assist in your job search with resumes, interviews and job listings.

"There are three different ways to get resumes reviewed," said Rhonda Boyles, associate director for Career and Counseling Services. "The first, is to drop it off and within two to four days we will have a chance to look it over, make comments, and then call the students to let them know it's ready to be picked up. The second, is students can bring a resume in and sit down with us as an appointment or a drop in and we will go over it with them."

Boyles says the second method is the way she prefers to help students because she can sit down one-on-one and interpret what a student is trying to convey about the resume.

"If someone is sitting there, I can actually ask the student what he or she meant to do or what he or she was trying to achieve with a statement that he or she has made in the resume," Boyles said. "That way I know how to make suggestions in revision to make it stronger for him or her. If a student comes in person, it gives me a better sense of what his or her intent is and helps make that document as strong as possible."

Boyles says a third option is available for students who do not have complete resumes. She suggests these students make an appointment to work out the strategy and the content of their resume.

"The people [in Career and Counseling Services] work hard to get more exposure for the students through job fairs and contacting employers for recruitment," said Shiven Kumar, Career and Counseling Services student worker.

Boyles offers points to keep in mind on writing resumes for changing careers and for promotions.

"I am firmly in the camp of using an objective, especially at this school because if you read the resume you are looking at changing directions," Boyles said. The kind of objective that I want to see on a resume, and that is least obnoxious to most employers, is the one that is about four or five words long. It basically says 'seeking a position in...fill in the blank.' It is very short and to the point. Everything else is fluff. If you want to add fluff, that is up to you, but don't go overboard. And avoid, like the plague, an objective that never really says anything."

Boyles says common sense is a huge factor in the resume process.

"[Consider] the best impact on the reader," Boyles said. "If you are trying to focus them away from history and on a new direction, you want education to be the next section [after the objective]. If you want them to focus in on your skills and your experience, then experience will be the next section and education will be later. There are a lot of acceptable ways to do resumes, but just keep the reader in mind."

Boyles points out the office of Career and Counseling Services is a full-service career service outlet. This means that in addition to offering help with resumes, they also offer mock interviews and job listings.

"The Career Counseling Service office teaches you how to talk to employment personnel," Kumar said. "The students [who come to the Career and Counseling Services office] do improve on their job search skills and develop new strategies. They increase their knowledge on the jobs they are seeking. It is the best platform to use to get a job. When you get a job through the university, it shows you are one of the best."

Career and Counseling Services has job resources offered in a database for a fee.

"This is for students who want to keep their resumes on file with us for employers who call and ask for referrals," Boyles said. "Our job listings are in there so it's very convenient for you to do your job search through those listings. However, there are hard copies in the office, you don't have to pay to look at job listings. For those employers who do come to campus to interview, we don't have a huge program but we do have some regular employers, people will actually have to get into the database for that. The fee is $20 for the first year you are in [the database], that year runs from September 1 to August 31. Late in the summer, we work at a discount. And then anytime you want to renew in the future, after the first initial fee, it is a $10 renewal fee."

"If you are back in the job market in five years and you need to get back into the database, it is still $10," Boyles said. "This gives students access to student services as a student and as an alumni graduate."

Boyles says there is another service being added to Career Counseling Services to assist students in their job search.

"We are initiating a new service called The Alumni Mentoring Network," Boyles said. "We are asking UH-Clear Lake alumni to volunteer their time to be expert resources to students. We can tell you a little bit about what it's like to work in certain places or in certain kinds of career fields, but alumni who are in those field can give a better perspective of that. It's a resource that is available to students and also to other alumni. It's already active, we are just starting to build [names for the database]. We have 10 to 20 alumni that have already started and have submitted information to be in the program. We are going to do a big marketing push within the next few weeks to contact several thousand alumni to fill our database. Students or alumni who want to get in the program need to be in the database because they have direct access to that information. If not, they can ask any individual here and we will help them find some contacts."

"For $20 we try to make it convenient to get to a lot of resources without having to go through a lot of barriers," Boyles said. "But we also make most all of that information free of charge, in some capacity, so that students who don't want to get into the database will have resources."

Boyles offers students ready to enter or re-enter the workforce advice on their job search.

"Persistence and patience are key factors in the job search market at anytime, but especially right now," Boyles said. "Flexibility is one of the major factors. We have a lot of students and new graduates who want to stay in the area due to family ties and other reasons. However, what I am also finding is that some of job opportunities are not in our local area. Flexibility is needed to either to look beyond the area, or to look at other opportunities that may not be first choices to fill the gap of time until such time the opportunities they really want do come along." Boyles said.

Students have come back and told me that the job search is a full-time job.

"This is something students need to be aware of," Boyles said. "It is not something you can do periodically and expect significant results."

For more information, contact the Office of Career and Counseling Services at (281) 283-2600 or in Bayou Building, Room 2537. Students can also get information on self-help tips, including information on resumes, at the Career Counseling Web site at uhcl.edu/ssc/sca/ccsframe.htm.

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