Summertime

First of all, congrats to the Class of 2007! Commencement is an exciting day, albeit tough for those of you leaving the friendly confines of Blacksburg behind. For those of you heading out into the work force, where is your career taking you? Down the path you had envisioned when you first arrived at VT? Or the complete opposite? What steered you in that direction? And what advice would you leave behind for those soon to be entering the job search process?

I ask because, as I meet recent graduates and new engineers, I recall the process I went through during my final semester at Tech. Everyone has a different strategy in seeking out potential employers and exposing themselves to the job market as much as possible. But come Career Fair week, or end-of-semester time, you need something to separate yourself (and your resume) from the stacks of applications the employers will be sifting through when they've got a spot to fill. For me the most valuable section of my resume was prior experience. Don't get me wrong, your coursework is important and it makes for a great foundation. But you can't teach real world experience in a classroom. Internships and/or co-ops are a great way to start networking, and to test out your area of study, to see if civil engineering is the direction you want to head with the rest of your education and eventual career (and, of course, you'll inevitably find that civil engineering is the greatest profession known to man).

The land development industry is as dynamic as almost any engineering line of work and it has the potential to put to use any and all areas of study in a civil engineering curriculum. Couple that with urban sprawl and the booming construction industry and you've got countless opportunities to gain valuable real world experience, expand your contact list, test the professional waters, and put to the test all that hard work in the classroom.