Students Design Their Own Lives in Fall Career Connections Class, Spots Open for Spring 2021

Justin Silver

Top: Learn how to 'Design Your Life' this spring in the Career Connections Class. Bottom: One Personal Externship Project example is chemistry undergrad, Justin Silver's project at Cheers Restaurant. Silver worked with his manager to learn about supply, demand and inventory purchasing to create this special dish.

While gaining professional experience through an internship was definitely more difficult this fall because of the pandemic, the students in Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences' Career Connections class (ARSC 3013) rose to the challenge — crafting their own Personal Externship Project (PEP) experiences to gain professional skills.

This elective, 3-hour class, championed by the college's Student Success team has been offered for the past four semesters. In the class, students learn how to use design thinking methods and complete the University Career Development Center's Razorback CareerLink program to develop career management skills.

The design thinking curriculum, shared by Stanford University's Life Design Studio, teaches students to harness five design mindsets (curiosity, radical collaboration, reframing, bias toward action and mindfulness of the process) to engage in interactive, experiential design thinking in-class activities and reflective exercises. 

"This semester our students engaged in an exciting journey to truly design their own lives," said Erica Estes, the college's director of employer relations and the Career Connections course instructor. "We adapted to our changed environment by prototyping a new assignment that allowed students to use organizations they were already connected with, or campus departments they had an interest in learning more about, to design a project that mirrored the competencies they might gain through a formal internship." 

Estes said students were required to develop learning objectives with an organizational or campus department leader; complete action steps that aligned with key career competencies valued by employers and met organizational needs; conduct an informational interview with this leader; write an organizational report documenting the history and structure of the organization; practice articulating their PEP accomplishments as if they were discussing it in a job interview; and create a presentation highlighting their accomplishments and reflecting on their overall project experience. 

The results were highly successful with one student reflecting, "This has been one of the most important classes that I have taken during my college career." 

While the 35 participating students engaged with a wide range of organizations, the overwhelming response was that they all gained similar professional skills such as goal setting, professional communication, networking, event coordination, and technical skills. 

Estes said that some students created their project within the company they worked in as a part-time job. Others collaborated with campus organizations in which they held leadership positions, academic or student affairs departments in which they wanted to learn more about or volunteered with community nonprofits. 

"Most students commented that engaging in the semester-long Personal Externship Project allowed them to realize resume-worthy accomplishments they otherwise would not have pursued," Estes said. "In almost every situation, students gained a stronger relationship with their organization or department leader, which allowed them to gain a deeper understanding of the professional world."

"And in some cases, the Personal Externship Project resulted in the student being hired or receiving a professional recommendation to further their career within this industry," she added.

Career Connections will be offered again in Spring 2021, but with an added component. 

This spring, students will again be given the opportunity to cultivate a Personal Externship Project, complete Razorback Career Link modules, and use design thinking to reframe their career development methods, but they will also be offered a professional speaker series. 

The class instructors, Estes and Zach Meyer, the college's coordinator of student recruitment, are reaching out to a diverse array of industries and companies to offer an opportunity for students to learn from and network with hiring managers and recruiting professionals. 

This Career Connections Virtual Speaker Series will be open to all students and will be promoted as individual information sessions on Handshake, the U of A's career platform. 

For more information, please reach out to Erica Estes at ericae@uark.edu.