Hosted by Education and Professional Development at Penn Engineering
Describe your experience working with your host:
For my CEF experience, I was lucky enough to be paired with Dr. Kristin Field in the Education and Professional Development at Penn Engineering office. When I first came into her office my career interests were so uncertain that when she initially asked what I would be interested in doing all I could say was that I liked learning and would like to make the world a better place. Despite this embarrassingly vague answer, she was unperturbed and continued to ask increasingly incisive questions about my interests and goals; making it clear to me that she was genuinely interested in helping me figure out what to do with my life. After a long winding conversation that somehow included my personal struggles with committing to a PhD in the middle of a pandemic and her own non-traditional path to her current position, I left the office with a list of 4 career options to explore more thoroughly, down from an essentially infinite amount.
What did you learn from this opportunity?
Although we did not have many formal one-on-one meetings, Dr. Field invited me to several other career exploration panels and workshops which she oversaw the organization of, helping me further refine my understanding of the potential career opportunities we’d discussed and introducing me to other potentially helpful connections for my slowly growing network. The CEF workshops on Resume preparation and LinkedIn profile setups also gave many handy tips on how to better prepare those job search materials.
How does your CEF experience benefit your future career plans?
The CEF experience gave me many useful leads to follow up on for potential career opportunities, giving some much-needed structure to the formation of my future career plans. Having participated in the 3rd year of my PhD, I now feel that I have ample time to further refine my interests and skills so that I am well prepared for the job search upon graduating.
What was the most valuable part of your CEF experience?
I believe being able to narrow down the number of careers that best align with my skills and interests with the help of someone much more experienced in the kinds of jobs that are available to someone with my background has served to greatly alleviate the anxiety I used to feel regarding the post-PhD job search. Being exposed to the many excellent resources that Penn has for helping graduate students prepare for the transition into the next phase of their career has also been very encouraging, since I now know where to go for answers to my career questions.
Top reason PhD students should apply to the CEF:
I think anyone who is still unsure about their post-PhD career plans would greatly benefit from participating in the CEF, as they will be able to interact with knowledgeable mentors that can help them home in on the careers which are most suitable for them. They will also become acquainted with the large array of resources that Penn has to offer in the job search, as well as foster helpful connections for the next steps in their journey.
