Extending the Study Abroad Experience

          With just a few months to go before my graduation, I have begun the process of job searching. I call it a process, because it feels like just that, a process. To put it as one of my fellow job seeking seniors put it I am "mining the internet" in an attempt to find gold (a job!). However, as someone whose study abroad experience had a profound impact upon my life, I am determined to work overseas for a period of time. Therefore, the question is, how can I take my time abroad, and use it to my advantage in the "real world"?
         Recently, this question has been at the forefront of my mind. Fortunately for me, I am not the only one who wants to know the answer to this question. I have found a surprising amount of resources readily available here at Mac, and would like to take the time to highlight a few of them.
         First, the obvious choice for Macalester students is the Career Development Center. A resource that is extremely helpful and should never be ignored, as they strive to assist students find the right career path. In addition to the CDC, the Study Abroad Office has recently joined the world of LinkedIn, a social media platform designed for the professional in all of us. If you do not have a LinkedIn page, I strongly recommend creating one, as it allows a user to network and locate jobs that may be unavailable otherwise. In particular, Macalester College itself has created a group and sub-groups to help keep our college community professionally connected. Recently, the Macalester Study Abroad Department has created a  LinkedIn page designed to assist Study Abroad Alumni in extending their study away experience into a post-graduate opportunity. Similar to the other Macalester LinkedIn pages, the goal of the group is to connect alumni and students, but it differs in its aim to focus on global fellowship and job opportunities. While perusing this LinkedIn page this week, I stumbled upon an article I found had particular relevance to my current post. Here is a great quote to end my blog post for the day-

"There are several ways that you can showcase your global experience, if you have any. And one of the ways is to talk about times that you might have studied abroad or traveled abroad. Any time that you have the opportunity to interact with colleagues in different countries. Maybe you have managed a project that was done overseas or included colleagues that were in many different areas of the world. That’s all global expertise. Even something as simple as reading The Economist on a daily basis and really having a good handle of the industry news that’s going on globally and that affects your company, those are really good ways to showcase that you are aware of the fact that there is a world beyond the U.S. and that we need to be concerned about it."

http://smallbusiness.foxbusiness.com/legal-hr/2013/01/15/what-employers-want-that-job-seekers-arent-mentioning/