Placement Office Gives Year-Round Job Advice

Sooner or later, almost everybody has to go to work. Every year about now this thought begins to assume unpleasant prominence in the minds of most of the College's Seniors.

A considerable number of graduate students delay the question of getting a job by entering graduate schools; a few others by-pass the problem altogether by such dodges as taking a desk at the paternal office, or by making a Grand Tour. But for the majority each year, the question of a post-college livelihood becomes one of urgency as Commencement festivities approach.

Panacea

To help solve this annual, large-scale employment problem, the Office of Student Placement was opened in Weld Hall at the end of the war. Now fully established with an impressive record already behind it, the Office is preparing a year-long schedule of counseling and advisory services that will reach every Senior in the College by June.

By means of circular letters to all Seniors and a series of career conferences on vocational fields, the Office registered almost a thousand undergraduates for its counseling service last year and was instrumental in obtaining for graduating Seniors a large number of positions in virtually all vocational fields.

Increase Expected

This year, the Office will follow the same general policies, and expects an increased volume of business from job-needy students. Under the direction of John W. Teele '27 and his assistant, Donald S. Bradshaw '44, form letters like those mailed out last year will be dispatched next month to all Seniors. The letters will give a general sketch of the Office's main purposes and will invite men to stop in for an interview--or just for window-shopping.

Letters like these drew almost one-hundred percent response from the Seniors a year ago. Many of the recipients previously had not known about the Student Placement Office. A series of career conferences for 1948-1949, similar to those held last winter, is also being planned by Teele's office. These meetings, held at regular intervals during the winter months, bring to the College leaders in field such as marketing and publishing who speak and answer student's questions.

Reading Room

One of the newest features of the Placement Office is the expanded reading room of vocational files and information that was opened this fall. The reading room, which adjoins the Placement Office, contains folders with employment information about all fields, as well as brochures and pamphlets issued by individual companies to aid potential job-seekers. Also on file at the library are transcripts of last year's career conferences, books and magazines of interest to job-seekers, and such other helpful items as telephone directories for most of the nation's large cities.

When a potential job-seeker registers at the Placement Office, he makes out a standard form and receives in return a booklet on vocational counseling prepared under Teele's direction.

"Resume"

Among other items, it contains complete directions for the registrant to draw up an informational "resume" about himself, which includes the vital statistics that will interest a prospective employer. The candidate uses this as a personal publicity release in his job-hunting. Toole stresses the importance of well-organized press-agentry for career-seekers.

A few of the positions obtained through the aid of the Student Placement Office last year were:

Reporter, Boston Record-American; assistant television producer, World Video; seasonal park ranger, Shenandoah National Park; editorial department. American Telephone and Telegraph; editorial department, Collier's; translator, export, division of Kaiser-Frazer; and a position in the South American branch of the First National Bank of Boston.

Toele emphasizes that the earlier a Senior begins to think about a job he will have to get after graduation, the better his chances will be to find his niche.

The Student Placement Office is open from 9 to 5, five days a week, and from 9 to 12 Saturdays.