The Hiatt Career Center, located in the Usdan Student Center, is a resource for both students and alumni that assists with searching for jobs and internships, checking resumes and cover letters and much more. As their website states, “Hiatt helps Brandeisians know who they are, what they want, and how to get there.”
Jon Schlesinger, director of Hiatt, has been at Brandeis for two years and manages the “day to day operations” of the center as well as overseeing the career development team and Hiatt’s engagement with the campus community.
As the new year and spring semester begins, Schlesinger and the rest of the staff at Hiatt hope to continue working towards the center’s goals. “There are a couple things we’re really focused on. One is working with first year students” and helping first years and mid-years become familiar with the office and online resources, Schlesinger explained.
“Career is not a one-off decision, it’s multiple decisions that people make, and we want to work with students through those changes and help them explore those different kinds of opportunities,” said Schlesinger.
Hiatt has been working with the Department of Community Living (DCL) to spread messages through the residence halls in effort to reach more first-year students. The advantages of first-years using Hiatt as a resource are not only to kick start their thinking about the future, but also to give them time to meet the Hiatt staff and form relationships that will last through their time at Brandeis and beyond. Hiatt services are “for life,” and are open to alumni.
Hiatt also works with plenty of students from each class year, regardless of whether they have visited Hiatt before, or if they are coming for the first time during their senior year. A program primarily for seniors, but open to all students, is the upcoming Career Accelerator Week from Jan. 22 to 26. It will help seniors “[accelerate] towards their goals and thinking about post-Brandeis opportunities.” Other events coming up include a week of programming on marketing at the end of February and the “Just In Time” fair in March, where professionals will come to recruit students for internships and jobs.
The beginning of the new year, for many industries, is a great time to begin thinking about and applying to summer internships. “This is a great time to come in, start brainstorming, collaborate with somebody from Hiatt and talk about how to strategize for your summer internship search,” said Schlesinger. “We can work together to talk about resources, and to make the search more productive.”
Hiatt has been working on achieving many goals, the biggest being efforts to build relationships and connect with the Brandeis community. “We are really interested in ways that we can collaborate.” Schlesinger said that the center hopes to continue its outreach to student groups and clubs and “encourage them to come to Hiatt with ideas for connecting with the community and alumni,” as well as partnering on career-related events and programs.
Schlesinger also mentioned Hiatt’s social media efforts, led by Kristin Menconi, which bring “humor into the office” and help provide information to students in an accessible way. Another one of Hiatt’s resolutions for this year is to update their office, adding new artwork, alumni quotes and a new collaborative table space.
Hiatt’s newly revamped website includes helpful new tools for students to explore. Under the heading “Majors and Careers,” the Identity at Work section gives students resources and information that will help enhance career development.
Also under “Majors and Careers,” the interactive Beyond Brandeis tool is an collection of data that Hiatt has compiled from Brandeis alumni since 2008. Schlesinger said that many students want to know what other Brandeisians have done with their majors. With this tool, students can see what alumni with their majors have done post-graduation, including what job titles they have, their employers, their location within the United States and the percentage that have gone to graduate school.
Schlesinger’s advice to students who have not yet visited or fully explored Hiatt is to “get started and try something.” Students can come for a drop in meeting or schedule a ‘Welcome To Hiatt’ appointment through the Handshake page. “That’s the best way to figure out what it is that you’re interested in, whether that is exploring summer internships, volunteer opportunities, or just taking a new class.”
