OCS Reaches Out to Young Alumni

Young alumni received an e-mail last Friday from the Recent Graduates Committee encouraging them to use career resources, including the Office of Career Services and Crimson Compass, during the current economic downturn. The e-mail highlighted the newly created Crimson Careers database, which lists jobs available for both students and alumni.

The efforts generated immediate results. The database received a surge of 120 new users registering on the day that the e-mail was sent out, according to OCS Associate Director Susan M. Vacca.

“As a committee we saw the need to help our fellow alumni/ae during this challenging economic time,” Kelly A. O’Shea ’02 and Joshua M. Mendelsohn ’05, co-chairs of the Recent Graduates Committee, wrote in an e-mail statement.

The e-mail from the Recent Graduates Committee—which was crafted with the help of OCS—was intended to encourage recent graduates to tap into OCS’s resources.

Vacca said that alumni have not contacted OCS with more frequency this year than in past years, despite the economic downturn. She attributed this lack of change to graduates using personal networks rather than OCS resources, adding that information is available online so alumni do not need to call OCS for help.

“If we have done our job well, we’ve taught them how to develop opportunities for themselves,” Vacca said.

Reva P. Minkoff ’08, a former Crimson staff director, used OCS resources after graduation, but said that she did not “feel like they were particularly helpful.”

“They tried, and their heart is in the right place,” she said.

OCS is useful for alumni in Boston and New York but is less effective for graduates outside those areas who are uninterested in going to graduate school, Minkoff said.

Other recent alumni agreed.

“They’re certainly great for an educational perspective like learning about careers, probably less helpful in actually getting a job, which is what we want at this point,” added Carrie E. Andersen ’08.

But Minkoff—who is on the Recent Graduates Committee and helped craft the e-mail—did emphasize the importance of the Harvard name and alumni networks. Minkoff, who switched jobs, said she hated her old job but loves her new one as the editor-in-chief of a start-up Web site.

Vacca said the current economic recession also has some benefits, forcing graduates to consider jobs outside traditional industries like finance or consulting and think more broadly about career options.

—Staff writer Danielle J. Kolin can be reached at dkolin@fas.harvard.edu.