What a difference a year makes: job seekers met with employers during a BU jobs fair in February 2019, before COVID-19 put the kibosh this year on such gatherings. Photo by Jackie Ricciardi

Jobs

BU Center for Career Development Increases Help for Students as Economy Worsens

Online appointments, expanded support for unpaid internships now offered

Just two months ago, seniors looking for jobs could anticipate graduating into the nation’s longest ever economic boom. Today, whiplashed by an economic 180 engineered by the coronavirus pandemic, they’re being compared to the generation that faced the job-starved Great Recession of the late 2000s.

With forced business idlings, layoffs, and furloughs, more than 16 million Americans have filed new unemployment claims. Goldman Sachs forecasts the jobless rate nearly tripling to 9 percent in coming quarters, from just 3.5 percent in February. Other analysts foresee Great Depression-level unemployment.

The recently enacted $2 trillion in federal relief includes $350 billion and other provisions for small businesses. But BU’s Center for Career Development (CCD) isn’t waiting for that help.

“While the numbers are currently small, we are beginning to hear some reports of job or internship cancellations,” says Denise Mooney, associate vice president for enrollment and student administration, who oversees the CCD. In response, the center has adjusted its services for both job-seeking seniors and intern-hunting younger students. 

For the former, CCD services have migrated online, so students now living back home can access them. CCD staff continue one-one-one appointments, remotely, for tailored advice, and are running one or two virtual workshops every day, Mooney says. The center advertises the availability of these services and tips for job-hunters on social media.

Other online tools include Handshake, a “career management hub” allowing students to make appointments and also to network with BU alumni, and the résumé-review software VMock.

“Our focus,” says Sarah Thomas, CCD marketing and communications manager, “has always been on providing students with strategies for finding jobs that serve them well in all economies and at all phases of their professional life.”

Meanwhile, a major internship support program for sophomores and juniors has been expanded to accommodate more students. The Yawkey Nonprofit Internship Program supplements the unpaid internships of nonprofit groups for BU sophomores and juniors with a living stipend. It also pairs interns with a CCD staffer who “helps ensure a positive internship experience,” Mooney says.

“We had already made the decision to expand class year eligibility to students participating in the summer after their junior year,” starting this summer, she says, even before the pandemic. Now, COVID-19 has induced more changes.

For the first time, the program this summer will support virtual internships, as long as they meet the program’s other requirements, Mooney says. Interested students have an extended application deadline (to May 17), and in another change, may complete a prerequisite workshop virtually.

The CCD also is working to accommodate employers facing a new world. The Yawkey summer program normally requires interns to work at least 300 hours to qualify for its $4,000 stipend. Yet “employers who are now facing a virtual workplace, reduced activity, or other restrictions may find it challenging to offer 300 hours, but might otherwise be prepared to offer a high-quality internship experience,” says Thomas.

So this summer, students can apply for the Yawkey program with internships providing at least 150 hours—and earn a $2,000 stipend—or with limited, project-based internships that meet a 75-hour minimum and will qualify for a $1,000 stipend.

“This should increase students’ ability to participate in the kind of high-quality educational experience which defines the Yawkey Nonprofit Internship Program,” Thomas says, “and which is so important to helping students refine their career interests, build skills and experience, and increase their preparedness for future employment.”

“This is a time of great uncertainty,” she notes. “While many BU seniors anticipated a different economic outlook, we hear from employers every day that the skills and competencies taught by BU are still of value to them even in these times. We continue to provide the same support and guidance to students, and encourage any student uncertain about their next steps to use our resources and services.”