Jacqueline Peraza | EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
The University of Texas Rio Grande Valley Career Center will host the Fall 2020 Virtual Career Expo for students and alumni from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Thursday.
“The Fall Career Expo is the most greatly attended expos of the year, attracting national and regional employers seeking to hire UTRGV students and alumni for Internships and Careers. Participating employers are eager to provide information about their organization and opportunities available to students and alumni,” according to the event’s Handshake page.
Students will have the opportunity to speak to recruiters from over 59 employers. Employers set to attend the expo include DHR Health, H-E-B, IDEA Public Schools, PlainsCapital Bank, Peace Corps, the Austin Fire Department and SpaceX.
Ronnie Garcia, assistant director for Employer Relations, said anyone planning on attending the expo can RSVP and register through Handshake.
“Also if they go to the my.utrgv.edu portal, it’s one of the slides,” Garcia said. “If they click on the actual photo of the Virtual Career Expo, it’ll take them straight to the portal to create their account, upload their résumé, etc.”
The Career Center will use a virtual platform to match attendees to employers during the event. The platform will ask for attendees to create an account by uploading a profile picture, résumé, major, classification, among others.
“Once they get on the platform, the day of the event, there’s a directory,” Garcia said. “You’ll see the logos of the different companies. If they see SpaceX, they can click on SpaceX, it’ll give information about the general overview of [the company]. … And there should be a button that says, ‘Chat Now.’”
Attendees have the chance to be virtually placed in line with more than one employer. When it is the student’s turn, they will be allowed to speak to recruiters for a maximum of 10 minutes through chat via text or video. A timer will be shown during the session for attendees to keep track of time.
“I always encourage video because it’s always nice for the recruiter to be able to see you,” Garcia said. “If students use the video component, again, we still want you to dress business professional … and make sure you have an appropriate background. So, just a clean wall or something that you feel is professional.”
He said in previous years the Fall Career Expo usually sees a higher turnout in students, alumni and community members attending.
“In Edinburg, I would estimate probably 900 attendees and on the Brownsville campus, we typically have 300,” Garcia said.
He said the center hosted a virtual event for students last spring but there was less of a turnout.
“I really want students to take advantage of this because it is at the convenience of your own home,” Garcia said. “You can just log on at home. You don’t actually have to drive to a physical location.”
The Career Center shares the number of people planning on attending and wants to ensure students who sign up show up to meet with potential employers.
“I understand everyone has a busy schedule, but then again, if you have an hour to spare, you don’t have to be there from 1 to 2,” he said. “If you don’t get out of class until 11, or get out of work until 11:30, you can log on at that time and attend the fair.”
The virtual platform is compatible with smartphones, iPads and laptops. All browsers work well with the platform but Garcia said he recommends students use the Chrome browser for a smoother experience based on feedback the center has received.
He said the main goal of the expo is to connect employers who are actively looking to hire UTRGV students for jobs or internships. For students who are not ready for jobs, it serves as a way to explore what careers interest them.
“Ultimately, we’d love to see students hired, but we also want students to be aware of opportunities that can be available to them in the near future,” Garcia said. “That’s really our goal. To make sure that we have students networking, talking about careers, hopefully getting a career or internship, or figuring out ‘Is this the right organization for me to develop my future career?’”
