“Hardworking,” “responsible” and “sarcastic” are all adjectives that describe Career Peer Rachel Shamaly. Rachel’s quirky sense of humor wins her the award of “Office Comedian,” and brings an uplifting mood to the office. Her puns have even made appearances on the Career Services social media channels.
Upon coming to the office, she had an unfortunate experience at an unpaid internship. She wanted to bring this experience to the attention of Career Services to ensure that other students would not suffer a similar fate.
Rachel’s Roles at the Office
“I am creating a financial literacy plan as part of training for Career Peers, and it will also be adopted by the Career Specialists so they can work with students about financial literacy.”
This plan will include information related to students loans (how to pay them back), budgeting, saving, and spending. Rachel is passionate about finding ways to help people with their financial decision making and focusing on long-term impacts rather than short term.
She also examined the engagement rate of Hire A Vike, and was able to pinpoint which groups of students were not using the system (freshman and sophomores). This made it possible to identify which groups would need to be targeted.
Her biggest Takeaway?
“Networking.”
Rachel now understands, “how important networking is and how relationships can get you in the door. Fostering and really taking care of those relationships can help you land the job of your dreams in the industry or the business that you desire.”
Her Lightbulb Moment
Rachel found that the Career Peer duty of posting jobs in Hire A Vike really opened her eyes.
“I saw all of the different industries and jobs that are out there and it made me realize all of the different things you can do with different degrees.”
“Another thing that hit me was realizing and determining what I am passionate about – and knowing to a degree (pun intended) that your major matters, but it doesn’t necessarily pigeon hole you into one sector. I have realized even though I am not a finance major, I can still work with finance.”
What should students know?
1. “Come here early and come here often. The better relationships you build here, the better relationships you will build out in the world. There’s a lot of really great connections you can make just by attending our events. You’re not going to do that by sitting on the sidelines for every single event.”
2. “I didn’t go to any of the events before I started working here and I really feel like I really missed out – not necessarily with needing the practice, but just engaging with people in different industries and at different levels in their career and knowing how to do that. I think everybody should be able to do that.”
3. “I don’t want people to wait until their senior year [to visit Career Services] and expect to have a job. Getting a job or an internship is a lot of hard work—and it takes building your resume and your character—which is difficult to do during the last month of senior year.”
*Mic drop*
More about Rachel
Rachel is pursuing a B.B.A. in Business Economics and is expecting to graduate in May 2020. Rachel is an avid video game player and loves Middle Eastern food.
More about Career Peers
A Career Peer’s role is to make sure the front end of the office runs smoothly by managing student, faculty, and employers’ requests via phone, email, and walk-ins. Career Peers serve as ambassadors to other students on behalf of the Career Services office, helping their peers understand all of the professional development tools, resources, and strategies they need to be successful as aspiring and evolving professionals.