By: Fiza Ahmed Baweja
The annual career fair is the main vehicle whereby multiple careers are represented and students have an opportunity to hear from an array of professionals. Following the mentorship event held earlier in the year, the career fair was held at the KGS College Section (for all O and A Level students) on Saturday, October 20, 2018 in collaboration with the Old Grammarians’ Society. There was also an informative and educational talk on college admissions, degrees to pursue and possible career paths by guest speaker, Salman Ahmad, who is Managing Director Pakistan & Senior Partner of Mckinsey & Company.
The career fair is a powerful way to help students become career ready. There were twelve career panels this year, each panel represented by two professionals at different stages in their career, with a total of twenty-four professionals invited to guide the students. There were two 40-minute sessions with panels running concurrently, giving students enough time to hear about the professionals’ experiences as well as ask questions to satiate their curiosity. The careers represented this year were Accounting/Finance, Architecture, Biological Sciences and Medicine, Consultancy/Business Management, Engineering, Entrepreneurship, Journalism, Law, Hi-Tech, Film Making and Performing Arts, Academia/Research, and Marketing/Media.
Students are overwhelmed with their future goals at a very young age, when they are required to choose the degrees they wish to pursue leading to a career path. They are conflicted with various advices from family and friends, so it is refreshing for them to get an outside perspective from leading professionals in their fields. Students asked the panelists various questions such as, “ What are the advantages and disadvantages of being in this specific career?”, “What are the work hours?”, “How to get an internship to get a flavor of the career and add to the resume?”, “How would you define success in this career?”
The student feedback forms proved that it was a meaningful and engaging event for students. It left them with a sense of direction and purpose. As seen in the graphs below, majority of the students found the event “very useful.” Just as the previous event, students ranked the quality of panelists and format of the discussion, having panelists respond to questions categories above 4.5 on a scale from 1 to 5 (with 5 being the highest).
[slider id=”1452″]The Career Fair presents students with the opportunity to broaden their knowledge regarding professional opportunities in the market and to build relationships with prospective employers. Students are able to have multiple conversations, network, inquire more about their field of interest, explore different careers, and use this opportunity to ask questions. We hope that the KGS-OGS liaison continues to connect students with committed alumni who are excelling in their professions, and willing to share their experiences and wisdom with the youth that will be our future workforce.
