Embarrass Yourself This Summer

Natty Leach, Associate Director A couple of weeks ago I stumbled across Mike Boyd’s Youtube channel dedicated to learning new, often frivolous, skills. The first video I came across, for instance, focused on an MIT physicist’s peculiar ability to quickly make a dotted line across a chalk board. 

For the chalk trick, it only takes Mike a few minutes; other videos chronicle upwards of 8 hours of attempts. Regardless of the task at hand, every video shows him starting from scratch with what some might consider embarrassing results. And that’s what I found most impressive about these videos—through every failure, no matter how public, he betters himself until reaching the goal in mind. So this summer, I recommend that you do something completely new and different, even if it feels embarrassing to try at first. Whether you’re busy at a new internship or just taking a break this summer, do something you’ve never done before, no matter how big or small, and relish in eventually conquering it. If you’re not as bold as Mike and would rather do some trial and error before hitting the big stage, here are a couple of projects that you can easily do, embarrassment-free, from the comfort of your couch: A small thing to easily familiarize yourself with this summer: Handshake – Career Services’ new job and internship platform. Handshake Mastering Handshake will only take you a couple of minutes. Check out our Handshake Hints on getting started. If there’s anything I can stress, it’s completing your profile and marking some career interests. Handshake’s homepage shows you opportunities that are molded around your interests so the more choose, the more you’ll see. A bigger project you could tackle: Anything on Lynda, a tutorial database that’s free to Penn students. Lynda.com Lynda has a ton great, skill-oriented tracks you can follow along with. Most videos are digestibility small (10-20 minutes) while full collections can total 40+ hours of hands-on training. Last year, I took a few courses on drawing, game design, and JavaScript.

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CS Radio – Episode 42: “Introducing Handshake”

Say how do you do and shake hands!  Last week, we were thrilled to announce to the campus that University of Pennsylvania Career Services will be moving to the Handshake platform this summer.  Michael and Mylène are joined by Handshake’s Director of University Growth, David Shull, who gives some insight into Handshake’s story and philosophy and shares a preview of what students and alumni can expect when the system goes live on June 1st.  Plus, the semester may be coming to a close, but there’s still events on our calendar, so we’ll give you the usual run down.

This is our second season finale.  We may be back over the summer with a special bonus episode, but regular weekly programming will return in September.  Thank you for subscribing!

 

Announcing Handshake

I am delighted to announce that beginning in June, Penn Career Services will be moving to the Handshake platform for job and internship listings, workshops, career fairs, on-campus recruiting and employer presentations.  This platform is used by 170 schools (including many of our Ivy Plus peers) and 120,000 employers; it offers many features that we believe will enhance the student user experience, including the ability to make appointments with career advisors using the online scheduling system. We are excited to launch Handshake at Penn, as it is intuitive, well-designed and cutting edge in its approach.   We will keep PennLink, our Symplicity system, live through June 30, 2017.  After June 30 you will no longer be able to retrieve any information on past applications and interviews, nor will you be able to access your documents. 

We will be following up by email in late May with information on how to join and use Handshake.  Since both platforms will be live during June, you can download resumes or cover letters from PennLink and upload them to Handshake if you wish.  If, however, you will be busy in June, or traveling without good internet access, you should download your documents now.  They will not be available after June 30.

For now, full-time jobs and internships are still being posted on PennLink.  Many employers are advertising interesting opportunities, so please continue to check PennLink regularly.  And it goes without saying that our office will be open all summer, and we are here to assist you today and in the coming months.  Please let us know if you have any questions. 

Best wishes for the end of the semester. 

 

 

 


Patricia Rose
Director, Career Services