The Baldwin Wallace Career Center launched a new program, the Yellow Jacket Career Mentoring Program, in the fall 2023 semester for English and psychology majors, connecting interested students with alumni mentors in their desired fields.
The year-long program aims to work with students and alumni to form a mentoring relationship, along with providing participants with a monthly workshop that focuses on job search skills.
Hannah Mostyn, assistant director for career education and student engagement, said the program stemmed from a meeting with her coworker where they were throwing out potential ideas that did not seem possible.
“We had a meeting with alumni engagement and we’re like, here’s some of our crazy ideas, and they liked the idea and we figured we could do it,” Mostyn said. “And then we have 13 students engaged, our goal was six, so we surpassed our goal in terms of engagement, and it felt like maybe we can take this crazy idea and make it something that will benefit students.”
While Mostyn said she hopes to see the program expand to other majors on campus, English and psychology students were targeted in the first cohort due to the flexibility of their majors.
Gabriella Ramm, third-year creative writing major, said she applied for the program to give her more support as she completes her degree and gets closer to entering the workforce.
“Honestly, I think it was the opportunity to have someone that has the experience I want to go into at my side and be able to grow knowing that I have someone there to support me and having someone who kind of knows what I’m going through, in a sense, career wise,” Ramm said.
Students in the program submitted applications last spring. The applications focused on the kind of mentorship relationship they wanted, as well as what type of careers they were interested in. This allowed the Center for Philanthropy and Alumni Engagement to pair students with alumni in the prospective fields.
Jena Parks, third-year English and marketing major, said that they want to use the program to help network within the English field and to learn more about grant writing and English careers in nonprofit organizations.
“Mostly, I’m hoping to make more connections in the field,” Parks said. “And I’m hoping to either definitively say that I want to go into grant writing, or if I can just rule it out, but basically I want to see more of the benefits of that job and if I vibe with it.”
Ramm and Mostyn both said they hope to see the program become campus wide once it takes off after this pilot year, giving more students opportunities to connect with alumni in the workforce.
“I think they should expand out to more majors because even the musical theater program would really thrive if they were to expand out that way too,” Ramm said. “I know that this is their first year doing it, so it’s kind of like a test trial just to see how it goes, but I do think that students would really take a lot out of being connected with alumni and learning about these experiences from them.”
