I attended a STARR career development center workshop to build networking skills on Friday last week. I found it to be extremely helpful when it comes to how to present myself in the professional world. It was very interesting how one of the first practices she mentioned was to always keep your right hand free in a professional business event/setting regardless of the fact that you may have food or a drink in your hand or your dominant hand may be your right one. At first it didn’t occur to me why she was telling us to do this, but as she went on explaining why we should get into the habit of doing this, I realized that it would be very un-professional to bump elbows with a person that you are trying to make a business connection with… and handshake is much more professional. She went on teaching us methods on how to enter and exit currently occurring conversations in the room smoothly without being rude or disruptive. She then went on explaining what we should do with the connections that we have established towards the end of a networking situation. A good idea was printing out personal student business cards to give to people as a quicker and more formal way of exchanging information opposed to putting one another’s phone numbers and information into each others phones. She also told us to verbally say thank you to whomever we met during the meeting and follow up later on in the near future with a hand written “thank you” card to further illustrate your appreciation of the new connection. My dad has always said to me… “It’s not about what you know, It’s about WHO you know” and I always thought that was just something that parents say, but after going to this event I realized that he was right!!

When I applied to Baruch College this December, I had no idea about how much this college had to truly offer. I had heard of its reputation as a great business college and that’s what eventually drove me to attend but what I didn’t know is all the great tools this college had to offer. One of the great tools offered here at Baruch is Suit Up by the STARR Career Development Center. Suit Up is a program that teaches students about proper business attire and how to eventually dress appropriately for job interviews and internships. In addition to helping students make appropriate stylistic choices, all of the clothes at Suit Up are really affordable.

When me and my friends (Ginelli &Danica) walked in we were greeted by this nice lady who told us to sign that we were there and offered to help us if we had any questions while we were there. Although I didn’t buy anything what impressed me was the variety of choices they offered ranging from: blouses, blazers, skirts, suits, accessories and footwear at a very cost friendly price.

Overall I believe that the things we learn outside the college classroom are just as important as why we learn in the classroom. College is a great place to learn about networking, establishing connections and learning proper business etiquette. So far Baruch has been excellent at offering all these great opportunities for us to learn about the real world through programs such as Suit Up, Mock Interviews and other workshops.

Anyway I just wanted to take this opportunity to also thank of all you guys for being great during our time together. I can honestly say that FRO was the most fun class I had this semester and you guys made it that. Special Shout out to Maggi and Dominique you guys were great as teachers and as mentors, thank you for all you taught us.

One of the great things about Baruch are the opportunities we, as students, get. There are many programs that are set up to help us do the best we can in specific subjects in school, but more importantly in the real world after the time of graduation. I am very appreciative that we have SACC, the tutoring centre, and we have the Writing Centre because they really help me with my school work. One of the other opportunities that I wanted to take advantage was STARR Career Development Center. STARR assists students for the future.

This past Tuesday, March 15th I went to one of  STARR’s events; Suit up for Success! Interviews are extremely important, its the first impression an employer will have of you. It is extremely important to look presentable, well dressed, and clean. The truth is some people do not have the financial freedom to buy work clothes that are suitable (no pun intended) for an interview for a job opportunity. The whole purpose of this event was to give students the opportunity to not only know what’s the right way to dress, as clearly shown by the slideshow at the entrance of the room, but to invite students to rent proper clothing for any interview they might have.

I saw many different styles of clothing, shoes, dress pants, slacks, button down shirts, blazers and ties that where available. Even though I didn’t find anything for me on this day, mainly because I do not have an interview lined up, I am very happy that I went to this event  because I was made aware of another benefit  the school provides of which I can take advantage of.

I am very excited to find out more about what STARR does, and how I could take advantage of the program to the fullest!!!