Graduates Turning To Extra Curricular Activities To Boost Employability

With a global recession going on, it is no longer a sure thing to get a degree, get a job, and be set for life. There are more and more students vying for fewer and fewer jobs. It is important to get real life skills that apply to jobs, and students are now taking this into their own hands.

Undergraduates at university have always been involved in extra curricular activities, but now they are using these activities to gain marketable skills. By creating student run organizations, undergrads are teaching themselves management skills that can be hard to come by at a young age.

While the extra curricular activities may not be the job a student intends to get after college, they can offer a ticket to a desired job. These activities can help students learn networking, confidence, social skills and technical abilities.

These student run activities also show potential employers that these kids have ambition and the drive to be self starters. Companies are no longer looking for a cog to fit into the corporate machine, they are looking for ingenuity and creativity. Signing up at the career canter for work experience does not look the same on a CV that creating your own job opportunity does.

Students are beginning to help one another instead of rely on career fairs and advisors to give them job advice. Students helping each other fosters teamwork, problem solving and communication. All of these are skills that employers are looking for.

Extra qualifications beyond a degree will give a prospective employee a good edge, especially if they are looking for work in the major cities looking for graduate jobs london or manchester for example . Students are even organizing their own career fairs with large companies to show off their skills. These fairs also allow students to make valuable contacts before they even leave the university.

Meeting employers face to face allows students to show their skills rather than just writing them in a resume. Being a self starter allows these students to branch out beyond just academic knowledge and show what they can really offer to a company.

It is important for students to be proactive about their own job skills training in such a competitive environment. Student run programs can sometimes get bogged down with such a high turnover rate that can stall things from going forward. That aside, students are taking more and more control of their own futures by creating and participating in more and more extra curricular activities.

The national council for work experience and the prospects.ac.uk websites have in depth resources to help you find the perfect placement or extra curricular experience to add to your CV.