College grads want careers in public service….now what?
There have been several stories in the news recently about young people pursuing careers in public service. While I think this trend has been happening for quite some time (some argue the interest was sparked by the Obama campaign and the sluggish economy) what’s missing from the conversation are the next steps. In other words…now what?
Young people have made it clear that they are interested in working for nonprofits. Yet the path to a career in the nonprofit sector is challenging. In response young people have often opted out of the sector as social entrepreneurs and free agents, so I am curious as to how organizations that work with young people are helping them find and engage opportunities in the nonprofit sector. I have two questions:
1. What are colleges and universities doing to prepare students for the nonprofit sector? The sheer diversity of the sector means that there are many paths and many opportunities. This does NOT mean that preparation is impossible. The first steps in helping young people find their place is exposure, awareness of their own interest and skills, and understanding the sector’s current hiring needs. How are college career offices discussing the nonprofit sector? Are they exposing students to the sector through books, panels discussions, internships, and examples of careers? Are students encouraged to connect their studies to social change work through academic and real life work?
2. How are nonprofits tapping into the sudden surge of millennial interest? There are some organizations that have developed a strong reputation for providing young people challenging and fulfilling social change opportunities. Teach for America, and Global Health Corps come to mind. But the reality is that nonprofits often dont have a plan for recruiting young talent. What does an effective recruiting plan look like? And for the many organizations that have students volunteer with them throughout their college tenure, how are their experiences being leveraging to encourage employment (at your organization or in the sector in general)?
What do you think: how can colleges and nonprofits support and develop interest in public service careers?
Hi Allison,
Great post and after my very heart! In the 6 years since I’ve graduated with my Bachelor’s I’ve seen incredible change in this area. When I went to college I didn’t know this 3rd sector even existed. I researched and explored an opportunity to teach English overseas on my own. When I came back to the U.S. I went to graduate school at Marquette University, and they have an incredible Service Learning program for all of their students. This program matches students with nonprofits, helping to complete projects and work related to their studies and majors…real life experience. They also proactively match graduates with national and international service programs to help launch their careers. Nearly every college in the Milwaukee, WI area is adopting a similar program.
Nonprofit careers provide incredible opportunity for young professionals (it’s here I should admit my bias as a former Board Member of our Young Nonprofit Professionals Network). Nonprofits, by definition, operate lean, which means employees have opportunity to design their own career path and, sometimes, even their job descriptions. Often, a young professional will be doing work they would never be able to do in the corporate sector because they wouldn’t be deemed “experienced” enough.
Some areas do this preparation and recruiting very well – I happen to live in an area that does. Other areas would do well to combine and cultivate centralized resources – like a nonprofit job board – to create a “one stop shop” for recruiters, educators, and job seekers.
Mandi
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ajlovesya Reply:
April 20th, 2011 at 2:35 pm
Thanks for sharing, Mandi! Whereas some see the lack of one defined path, I see it as an opportunity. You can easily gain exposure to different types of work and actually lead rather quickly. I would love to see more active engagement and exposure to the sector. For profits have no problem sending folks to talk about careers on college campuses…why cant we?!
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College grads want careers in public service….now what?: There have been several stories in the news … http://bit.ly/fXGoE5 #nonprofit
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College grads want careers in public service….now what? http://t.co/p4gJZ2G
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Love this – so true. The only reason I could land a nonprofit job straight out of college was because of a two year nonprofit internship I had held. I would love to see a stronger partnership between colleges and nonprofit internships – nonprofits need help and college students need exposure and credits. The best way to learn about the sector is to experience it.
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ajlovesya Reply:
April 20th, 2011 at 2:38 pm
Thanks, Chapin! I’ve heard of colleges having post graduate fellowships in public service (my alma mater did) that helps make the connection that you mentioned–maybe others will do the same? What other ways can we build that bridge?
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Great questions, Allison. I would love to hear more support from academia for programs (and nonprofit orgs, if any) that offer loan forgiveness, such as TfA and AmeriCorps. There’s nothing like $100k in school debt to make a nonprofit salary look unmanageable. While colleges and universities have little sway over what nonprofits pay their employees, they can publicize and build relationships with nonprofits and programs that remove debt burden as a barrier to service.
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ajlovesya Reply:
April 20th, 2011 at 2:41 pm
Good point Elizabeth. Some grad schools have loan forgiveness programs for folks entering public service work. Also, have you heard of the Public Service Loan Forgiveness program (after youve paid for 10 years which is a hellishly long time…).
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RT @undrcvrsocialwk: College grads want careers in public service….now what? http://t.co/I86AL1I
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Why aren’t colleges incorporating a larger selection of #nonprofit studies for students? http://ow.ly/4DMdn via @ajlovesya
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APSIA, an association of schools of international affairs, is a good way to learn about the best schools to prepare you for public service. While what constitutes public service is now split between the public, private, and nonprofit sectors, getting a degree that teaches both quantitative and analytical skills prepares one for many kinds of careers in public service. Internships are certainly a key aspect in a nonprofit career path, as is establishing and expanding one’s network. Many schools are now offering nonprofit management as a specialty as well.
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I think it is important that colleges and universities recognize what type of person it takes to work in a non-profit and help try to foster those characteristics. Also, if colleges were to help students find their passions and their talents, perhaps there might be more students wanting to be in public service.
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Hi, I work in the Internship Office for a human services program at a Big Ten University. Our University has a Career Services Department that provides many services for those in engineering, science and business. But services for the not for profits are sorely neglected. You know why? Because not for profits don’t have any money to pay the fees associated with attending our Universities Career Fairs or support human resource personnel or job recruiterS to attend. They are already understaffed and over worked.
We combat that in several ways, but primarily by getting our students out of the Career services office and career fairs and placing them in internships, offering them volunteer opportunities and developing Job shadowing experiences. In additions we offering help with Cover letters and resumes, interviewing. and most importantly networking with in those placements.
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[...] 1. It implies that careers are linear. There are jobs today that didn’t exist years ago. As a result of the weakening economy, we’ve realized that there is no such thing as economic security, prompting the rise of slash careers and side hustles. In other words, the market is different and the older approach of school –> job –> career simply doesn’t apply any more. This is especially true if you are interested in public service careers where a linear path never really existed. [...]