Education Majors Should Go to Career Fair, Too

Photo of the booklet describing the companies
that appeared at this year's Spring ICE.

Since my sophomore year, I have been attending the regular Career Fair that Miami offers in the fall, as well as Spring ICE, which is the spring version of the same event.

As an education major, I often feel out of place at these events, but I’ve found a lot of value in attending these events in terms of approaching potential employers, which is a skill I can transfer to the teacher job fair later this semester.

I chose to go to Spring ICE during my sophomore year in hopes of finding an internship. I hoped something would pan out, but I was exceptionally nervous about attending as a result of the fact that I am an education major.

However, if I hadn’t chosen to go, I wouldn’t have landed an internship as an intern for the training team of a mortgage banking company. Through this position, I was able to teach classes, create material for the classes, and the experience as a whole gave me more confidence going into my field experiences during the fall 2014 semester.

Moreover, through this internship, I was given the opportunity to apply for a position as a campus ambassador for the company, which also gave way to some really cool experiences.

When I returned to Miami for my junior year, I was able to host information nights on Miami’s campus, and I attended career fairs alongside the recruiters, which gave me a new perspective for what employers look for in their employees. As a result of these experiences, I feel I’ve been given an edge when I introduce myself to future employers.

Which brings me to why I think it is so important for education majors to attend these events too. While there are a limited number of education-based companies that attend these events, I think it’s more about the experience of learning how to talk about the skills that you possess and why you are the best individual suited for a particular job.

Because of these experiences, and the fact that I am more comfortable approaching potential employers, I feel more prepared than I think I would have otherwise in terms of attending the teacher job fair that Miami will host later this spring.