CAREER CHANGES

By Jace Uchtman, Public Relations Undergraduate Student

The University of Central Missouri has embraced change to help students succeed in an ever-changing job market. This year UCM Career Services underwent a full transformation, starting with a name change to the Career and Life Design Center (CLDC).

The new name better reflects the office’s role as more than just assisting with resumes and hosting job fairs but also offering support that helps students and alumni design — or redesign — their careers and their lives.

Thanks to donors and sponsors, the CLDC has remodeled its office space with state-of-the-art technology. An Opportunity Grant from the UCM Alumni Foundation helped fund the Professional Clothing Studio, featuring high-quality donated business attire.

The CLDC also became an early adopter of the “Design Your Life” program that originated at Stanford University.

According to a Federal Reserve Bank of New York report, only 27.3% of college graduates are employed in a job that matches their major. After a wildly successful class in the summer of 2007 geared toward helping students find jobs related to their degrees, two Stanford University professors, Bill Burnett and Dave Evans, wrote a book titled “Designing Your Life.” In December 2020, staff from the UCM Career and Life Design Center used Title III funding to attend virtual training based on the book.

“Life design has had such an influence on our office over the past couple of years that we really feel it is a foundational piece of who we are and what we want to be moving forward,” says CLDC’s director, Amber Goreham, ’04, ’18.

UCM’s staff has benefited from the design-thinking methodology. The Office of Integrated Marketing and Communications, Online Learning and Engagement, and Campus Community Health have all participated in CLDC retreats.

This summer CLDC held a virtual workshop series exclusively for alumni, which featured exercises such as energy mapping, finding moments of happiness and building a support community. In-person workshops were held for incoming freshmen during UCM’s Kickoff in August.

Along with the flagship Career Readiness course, students now have the opportunity to enroll in two other CLDC classes: Design Your UCM Transfer and Life Design. Alex Wilson, ’22, took Life Design in fall 2021, the first semester it was offered, and discussed his experience on the “Mules With a Mission” podcast.

“These are life skills that aren’t taught in other courses,” says Wilson. “More than career readiness but life readiness — analyzing what you want and need in life.”

Kendall Reger, who graduates in December 2022 with a degree in Political Science and Government, also took the course.

“I absolutely loved the curriculum,” says Reger, who now works as a peer mentor and coach for the CLDC Walk-In Studio Experience (WISE). “I felt it changed my mindset in a lot of different ways.”

The Career and Life Design Center offers lifetime support to UCM alumni and encourages them to utilize resources well beyond graduation. The Walk-In Studio Experience (WISE) was designed for individuals to access many resources simply by walking in. Resources include mock interviews, a free Headshot Central photo studio, resume help, job and graduate school searches and much more. Alumni can schedule an appointment to access these resources in-person or virtually.

In the past, CLDC would host one in-person and one virtual job fair each semester. There are now multiple, smaller job fairs based around a particular major or industry. UCM alumni are invited to represent their businesses or attend as job seekers.

Known for its accelerated learning programs and career-specific training, the UCM Lee’s Summit campus celebrated its 10th anniversary in 2022 and was honored by the Chamber of Commerce as the city’s Best Business of the Year. Clarinda Dir, UCM Center for Workforce and Professional Education program manager, oversees career-related services at the Lee’s Summit campus and works closely with the Career and Life Design Center.

In the spring, the Lee’s Summit campus will host its annual UCM Nursing Hiring Day.

Jenni Jarman, a junior in the Nursing program, has been taking classes at the Lee’s Summit campus and gaining clinical experience at St. Luke’s Hospital for the past two semesters. Thanks to the Nursing Hiring Day in 2022, she was able to secure a job at St. Luke’s.

“I would not have gotten my job if it wasn’t for this experience,” says Jarman, who enjoys the modern campus, technology and wide age range of students in the university community.

The University of Central Missouri is committed to ensuring that students and alumni have the ability to excel professionally in and beyond the classroom, as evidenced by the fact that 97% of UCM students launch their career or continue their education within six months of graduation. The Career and Life Design Center is contributing to their success by preparing them not only for their first destination but for whatever changes life might bring.

In addition to the Career and Life Design Center’s Professional Clothing Studio, UCM Farms was among the nine applicants awarded a total of $29,762 in Opportunity Grants for the 2021–22 academic year.

The Opportunity Grant was used to purchase a Miller/Bobcat 260 Welder/Generator that has allowed for small repairs to pipe corrals to be done more quickly and economically.

“As the Agriculture department continues to expand, we hope to integrate the welder into class projects built on the farms led by the Agriculture Mechanics students,” says UCM Farms Director Travis Hume, ’15, ’18. “The generator also allows for lights, grinding wheels, portable chargers and other power tools to be easily used when working in the field because we can transport the welder and generator in the bed of our Gator.”

The machine was a huge asset this past spring as students planted research plots and vacuumed out seed hoppers in between planting different hybrids of corn.

The UCM Alumni Foundation launched the Opportunity Grant program in 2013 to support targeted, innovative, student-centered ideas of UCM faculty and staff. Through a competitive process, the program provides one-time seed money for projects designed to positively impact the university’s learning environment and students’ academic experience. Since 2013, more than $400,000 in Opportunity Grant funding has been awarded, benefiting thousands of UCM students.

Projects awarded for the upcoming 2022–23 academic year include:

• Video podcasting equipment for Digital Media Production students

• Student seminar on gender discrimination in STEM fields

• Kitchen supplies for the expansion of the THRIVE program

• 3D tactile campus maps for blind and low-vision visitors

To find out more about this innovative program and how you can support it, visit ucmfoundation.org/give/magazine.