The last year in school is one of the most important years in your life. It doesnโt matter if youโre in college, graduate school, business school or even high schoolโthat last year of traditional education is critical for all students even if they donโt realize it.
Asides from graduating and bagging that degree, why is the last year in school so important? Why should you make your last year count more than any other?
Itโs time to start thinking about your career
Itโs simple, really: this is the year that you start planning your career. Itโs the year that you take a serious assessment of your skills and education and deicide what will be the first stepping stone into your life as a successful professional. The last year of your schooling is when you get serious about internships, specific vocations, and entry level positions with potential employers.
If you havenโt made any solid plans about how youโll spend your time after you graduate, now might be the time to start freaking out.
After your last year at school, youโll be expected to be a full-fledged adult with all the responsibilities and professional pressures that come with it. It doesnโt matter if youโre graduating from college with a degree in Art History or in Small Business Management, either way youโll be expected to thrive in the workplace as a fully adjusted professional. With the world economy in a constant state of crisis, and dismal unemployment numbers across the board, it will be unwise not to spend the last year of your cloistered school life trying to plan a successful entry into the real world.
Plan ahead
You can plan your transition from college student to young professional in a number of ways. For starters, itโs good to have at least a general idea of what you want to do once you graduate, which shouldnโt be too much to ask considering that youโve been taking different vocational courses for years now. Look for internships and entry level positions that relate to your major months in advance of your actual graduation date. Set up job interviews and familiarize yourself with the application process within your desired industry while youโre still in school.
If you do make an effort to sample the job market, treat those first interviews and job hunting experiences as practice rounds meant to train you for the real deal after graduation. Youโll find the job searching experience to be much less agonizing later on if you take the steps to plan ahead.
Trust in your friends and mentors
Your last year is also the time for you to talk to your closest peers and the professors that had a serious impact on your education about the trajectory of your future career. Your friends and mentors can be a great boon to you during this transitory period: professors might have professional contacts that could land you that first job; your friends could help you figure out just what it is that you want to do with your career. No one gets where they are in their career by their efforts alone. Everyone needs a helping hand, including you, so donโt be shy in asking for some guidance from those your trust.
Amanda Watson is well versed business blogger with a keen interest in how people earn their mba online. She believes that web entrepreneurship is critical to success in business. She can be reached at [email protected].