Boston College invited students to explore potential career options and speak to employers at the 2017 Career and Internship Fair on Tuesday. The event, held in Conte Forum, had representation from 148 employers looking to hire for both full-time and internship opportunities across a variety of industry areas.
Students attended the career fair to establish a connection with their companies of interest, give resumes to employers, or just to explore various fields. Grace McNamara, MCAS ’19, was very impressed by the BC community’s interest in the event.
“It was great to see so many students eager to take advantage of this opportunity.” McNamara said. “It’s inspiring to see both under and upperclassmen so focused on pursuing their career goals/”
Most employers look for current juniors to apply to their internship programs with the hope that they will recruit future employees. A number also invited sophomores to apply, and some even welcomed freshmen.
Many companies, however, are much further along in the recruiting process than one may expect. Amy Donegan, assistant dean for undergraduate career advising in CSOM, explained that banks and consulting firms have seemingly accelerated their timelines for students to apply to their internship and full-time positions.
Two years ago, banks and consulting firms moved their recruitment time to a much earlier period in the year. Last year, banks and consulting firms set the due date for their applications in the fall. And this year, all are in September.
“Banks come in the spring of sophomore year. Applications will typically open before students are back in class,” Donegan said.
A number of internship applications were already due days ago, such as Barclays’ Banking Summer Analyst application, Deutsche Bank’s Corporate Finance Internship Program application, and Citibank’s investment banking application.
Within the next week, applications for full-time positions with Accenture and Bank of Montreal (BMO) are due. The same is true of both full-time and internship positions with Deloitte and Bank of America. This does not even include a number of reputable firms whose applications were due on the day of the fair.
Goldman Sachs already had its Superday—where an investment bank invites a prospective employee to its headquarters for networking opportunities, meetings, and multiple interviews—and hired a few BC students for its 2018 Investment Banking internship program last school year.
These practices have various implications for students who wish to study abroad and during course registration. In the past, only students concentrating in accounting needed to be on campus in the fall for campus recruiting. They could then study abroad in the spring.
Now, students in all concentrations need to be on campus for campus recruiting, forcing them to study abroad spring semester, which also has a significant impact on the demand for on-campus housing at BC.
Plus, CSOM classes like Corporate Finance fill with sophomores looking to complete them earlier than recommended in order to prepare for internships for the upcoming summer. This leaves the school unable to keep up with the demand for these classes and incentivizes greater competition among students.
“The accelerated timeline gives students only four semesters of grades to apply with,” Donegan said. “If you had a bad freshman year, it could be a problem [at highly competitive firms].”
Feature Image from Heights Archives
