Career fair a win-win for students and employers

(Edmonton) Engineering students are taking advantage of a high-energy career fair, meeting with engineering professionals and future employers.

Being staged in the Engineering Teaching and Learning Complex Solarium Jan. 9 and 10, the Engineering Students' Society Career Fair has drawn dozens of companies-all 39 employer booths have been sold out for the first day, with the second day very nearly at full capacity as well.

The event benefits both employers and students.

"The companies that want to hire the best of the best engineering students-they want to be known," said Itati Fleites, a fourth-year mechanical engineering student who's helping organize the event. "Companies that are here both days, annually-our students know who they are."

Students and employers benefit because they're familiar with one another, she said, adding that some companies keep lists of students they've met at the career fair-and that can help students applying for jobs with those firms.

Workplace culture counts

Fleites is an engineering co-op student and has found engineering employment through the co-op program. But she gathered important career information by attending the fair and meeting with different companies.

"It was really helpful to speak with employers and find out what different jobs are like and if the companies are hiring. I didn't get a job but I did find the kind of people I wanted to work with."

Fleites says that feeling supported and welcome in the workplace helps students build confidence and develop new skills-and the people you work with are vitally important to that growth.

"I had this perspective, and I think a lot of young engineering students might think this way, that the corporate world would be like the movies-that it's fast-paced, that people wear suits, and that they make snap decisions. But the human resources people and the engineers who I met at the career fair were really nice. They listened to you and were interested in you. They care about you-they're here to help you."

With her co-director Cai Lin Yang working on a co-op placement with WSP Canada in Toronto, Fleites was getting front-line help from one of the event's many student volunteers, Jonathan Fleet.

Now in his fourth year of the chemical engineering co-op program, Fleet says that as a young student he benefitted from attending the career fair.

"It helped me understand the professional tone you need as a young engineer," he said. The experience, he added, helped him become familiar with engineering firms and other companies hiring engineers.

Now, as a volunteer, he's happy to be helping his fellow students organize and run the event-and he's hoping to find a job for his upcoming co-op placement.