Tag Archives: jobs

Graduation Stress:

For myself and many other FIT students, the next few months are going to be a whirlwind of emotions and to-do lists. Graduation, the next milestone in life, is in May at we are all freaking out extremely excited. Like other milestones in life, graduation can bring with it a lot of stress.

Here’s some advice I think is really good for keeping me calm as we near the day of cap tossing…

Explore different career and graduate school options and to utilize campus resources preparing students for graduation and a future career. Even if you might not have realized all the resources available to you.

Assess what’s important to you – including skills, interests and values. Learn about or to research different careers so that you are making informed decisions about things that might be a good fit for those skills and interests.

Time management is crucial. Write a pre-graduation to-do list and start working on different tasks gradually, then check them off. The first step is to register for graduation (and know deadlines in general), and the next tasks all depends on your goal. Just remember to not overwhelm yourself with all these expectations at once. Think of what you want to do most and what would be best for you, not what everyone else expects.

At the same time, be realistic. Of course you need to find some way to support yourself after college, so start considering your options now and plan ahead. You might not get your dream job right away, and that’s OK!

Establishing Your Resume

As the end of the semester is slowly approaching, establishing your resume is becoming more and more important, well, for me at least! Always editing and revising your resume is always a great way to keep up as you grow and build experience. Here are a few tips on having a strong, professional resume.

1. Keep it Simple

Like Coco Chanel has said “Before you leave the house, look in the mirror and take one thing off.” Don’t get too crazy on your resume. If you want to display more of yourself, be sure to include a link to your online portfolio.

2. Be Creative

Employers are always going through countless numbers of resumes. Be sure to stand out, even the littlest ways count. Most importantly, be yourself on paper.

3. Keep it Relevant

If you’re applying for a position as a social media coordinator, they’re not going to want to hear about your 6 months working at Forever 21 at a mall in your hometown. Revise and edit to display your most relevant experiences to the positions you’re applying for.

Mariano

Surviving Your Last Month at FIT

Although I’m not graduating this year, we are all preparing for the last few weeks at FIT! If you are graduating this year, here are some tips to survive the countdown to a new chapter in life!

1. Have fun!

The last semester in NYC can be stressful. Everyone is freaking out about what they are going to do after graduation, sending out job applications or preparing for one they have secured. It is important that you remember that you only have a few weeks left to be a college kid, so you need to make time to have some well-deserved fun. You have your entire life to sit at a desk working from 9-5 and only a few months left to stay out until 4 a.m. with all of your best friends—take advantage of this. Don’t waste the last month of your college career so stressed out about the future that you are unable to enjoy the moment. Live in the now, because you will regret it if you don’t later.

2. Keep up with the work.

That being said, it is also important to keep up with your schoolwork. Senioritis is STILL a very real thing, but make sure that it doesn’t get so out of control that you are scrambling at the end of the semester to pass all of your classes. I am not suggesting that you slave in the Feldman Center computer lab or the Gladys Marcus Library, but going to class and keeping up with your assignments will make your life so much easier come finals week. Why screw up what you have worked so hard for the last four years at FIT in your final semester? Have fun, but don’t completely neglect your school work.

3. It’s okay to not be okay.

This is a major key to surviving the beginning of the end. Yes, technically you are an adult now that you are graduating, but you are also only twenty-_______ years old (or older!). If you still aren’t 100 percent certain what you want to do with your life, the good news is that you are still allowed to change your mind. Try not to get too caught up in who has a job and who doesn’t. Have faith in yourself. You made it through four years at one of the most competitive school in the creative world. You are more than capable of landing a job, so, have a little faith and patience. It will all work out.

4. Snapshot your life.

Take as many pictures of you and your friends as you can. These will be nice to look back on after graduation when you are missing your friends and the place that you have made your home for the last four years – NEW YORK CITY. Document it all thoroughly, because grown up you will thank college you for it later.

5. Finish off your bucket list.

Remember all of those things you and your friends have talked about doing for the last four years, but never did? Now is the time for you to cross the remaining items off of your bucket list. You only have a few months left to do it, so live it up. In a few months you won’t be here anymore, so who cares if a couple of the items are embarrassing, it will be worth the Snapchat/Instagram story.

6. Spend quality time with your friends.

This is the most important way for anyone to survive their final semester of their collegiate career. The friends you make in college become your family. They are there for you every step of the way through some of the best/worst years of your life. They have seen you at your best and seen you at your lowest, but have loved you anyways. College would have been nothing without them, so make sure you are spending as much quality time with them as you possibly can these last couple of weeks. Soon you will be scattered across the country working your new jobs living in your very first apartment, and you will miss the days when they were just a room away. Don’t take these last few weekss together for granted.

7. Get Excited!

Graduating from FIT is bitter sweet. You are sad to leave the friends and life you have made for yourself the past four years behind, but you are also excited to see what the future holds. College might be over, but the rest of your life is about to begin. Make sure that you are excited about all of the amazing things that your future holds for you! There are so many places for you to go and things for you to see. Try not to focus solely on the things that you will be leaving behind. You are about to set off on an entirely new adventure.

The wonders of the job world

Hi everyone,

I hope you are enjoying your summer vacation. Its flying by , it felt like just yesterday we started summer. But for me that only means one thing, I am only a few months away from graduating and becoming a true full time employee.

With every degree you wonder , am I going to get a job after college? What jobs are out there? Who will hire me? and the answer is when your an FIT student jobs are endless! We are creative and unique people and that’s exactly why we chose FIT as the school for us.

Currently I am about to have two degrees from FIT. I have a background and associates in interior design and I am about to graduate with my bachelors in ITM or international trade and marketing. With both backgrounds my opportunities for jobs are everywhere! When people look at my resume from a marketing stand point they love that I have an interior design background, it shows my creative side and also that I am a good planner.

Some jobs that I have been applying to for after school include a little bit of both. One that I am really interested in right now is a company that manufactures bedding and ships them to the US internationally. This is great for me because I understand it from all aspects. Some other jobs are international account manager, strategic planner, event coordinator, marketing coordinator , importer/ exporter for both national and international companies. I may even end up staying at my current job which is a software company , being the head of sales, or something related to that or marketing.

My best advice is to interview for a few different options when looking for the perfect full time job for you. Feel out the company , see if its the right fit for you. Start this process about 2-3 months before you graduate, that way you aren’t left in the dark with nothing to do once school ends.

FIT also offers many services to help you find a job after school, as well as you can always reach out to us or even past professors.

Good Luck with your hunt :), and I hope this semester is the best one yet for you !

Xoxo

Kailee

Internships: the Good, the Bad and the Ugly

Everybody seems to have an opinion on internships. Are they necessary for “real world” learning? Is it just free labor? Do you actually learn anything worth while?

My opinion has certainly changed since starting at FIT. On the one hand, internships are necessary for the “real world” experience of working with a team, in an office and reporting to people above you. Almost any successful professional will tell you that working under someone is necessary, and you should do it even if it is unpaid. This is where it gets a little complicated.

On the one hand, internships offer (hopefully) invaluable experience, networking opportunities, helpful references, business insight and something to put on your resume. There is no doubt that employers want experience. It can also guide you in deciding what you actually want to do when you graduate. Even if you are absolutely positive you are going to be in advertising, do you want to work for a big company or a small company? An exciting but risky start-up, or a stable respected company where you will have much less responsibility or creative freedom? Are you sure the job you think you want is actually fulfilling?

However, many people now believe that internships are detrimental to students. They certainly take up a lot of time with most companies wanting at least two full days a week. It is also hard to quantify how much someone is learning at an internship. Are you just getting coffee, making copies and running things back and forth, or is your supervisor taking the time to make sure you understand what you are doing and, most importantly, why it is important? Most internships are unpaid, which brings up the argument that internships really only benefit middle to upper class kids who can afford to work for free. If a student is paying their own way through college it is unlikely they will have time for school, their job and an unpaid internship.

Of course, most places try to get around this now with “credit bearing” internships. These are also usually unpaid, but the student can get credit for a class. This allows the school to check up on the work place to ensure it is safe, and that the student is getting enough of an education to make the time spent there worth it. However, these credit-bearing internships are not offered by every company and usually require the student to add another class to their schedule. This limits the flexibility of their schedule for other classes and obviously takes away more time.

If I may interject with my own opinion here, I do think internships are necessary. The ones I did have certainly helped me see what jobs I thought I was interested in more clearly. I have been exposed to big companies, little companies and growing companies. I have learned a lot and made many helpful connections. However, I have never been paid for my work. I have never even been compensated for lunch or travel. Looking back now, it is very frustrating as well as quite disheartening considering I am looking for a job and having done all this work is not a guarantee I will get hired. I met a woman recently and asked her if she would ever need a research assistant. She replied that she would love an assistant, but could not afford to pay fair compensation at the moment, and did not feel it was right to accept that labor for free. Even though it was an opportunity I could not have, I was so happy when she said that! I mean it was so refreshing just to hear someone say, “I can’t hire you, but I respect you, your work, and your time too much to let you work for nothing.”

What are your opinions? Have you had any good or bad experiences with internships?

–Emily–