Make Your Summers Count for Your Career

Capitalize on your time off during the summer by adding experience to your resume

First published in jobpostings magazine
careers. education. ideas. all of it.

By Michelle Hampson

Image courtesy of JobPostings.ca

It’s midterm time. Coffee, review notes, lack of sleep: check, check, check.  Summer position lined up: wait, what?

That’s right folks. You may be busy with school right now, but employers are finalizing their summer positions. Student unemployment rates during the summer months are notoriously high, and you don’t want to be among the 7 percent aged 20 to 24 (according to 2011 Statistics Canada data) who are left unable to find work.

Let’s take a look at your options, and then how to make them happen.

Seasonal paid work

Here’s a classic. These jobs sync perfectly with the student schedule, give some monetary relief, and provide skills development. It can be a one-off gig, or something you build on over several summers. Take Ben Ornstein, a student majoring in Microbiology at the University of Toronto. For the past six summers, he has worked as a camp counselor at Camp Robin Hood. His steady involvement with the camp provides a reliable employer and letter of recommendation. And it complements his student schedule. “Since I have a two semester program, I can easily do this in the July-August period,” explains Ornstein.

This summer position has helped hone his communication skills. As Ornstein points out, kids have a short attention span, so getting your point across quickly is a talent. “And,” he adds, “it’s a very active job that’s good after being cooped in all day during school.”

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The internship

Don’t turn your nose up quite yet.  This very well could be the most powerful of all the options. Most internships are career-related, so there’s a nice résumé booster right off the bat. Even if it’s not career-related, skills you develop in these positions can be.

And best case scenario? You’re hired afterwards. Take Stephanie Wiriahardja, a recent grad of the Interactive Arts and Technology program at Simon Fraser University. She started off as intern at HootSuite and now works full-time for the hot social media management company as Community Program Coordinator. Even though her internship started in the fall of 2011 and coincided with two courses, the value and possibility of promotion still applies to summer internships.

“To me, internships are like going through post-secondary. I learned so much and gained real life experience without paying any money or doing any silly exams. That’s more valuable than any schooling,” Wiriahardja said in a Skype interview from Bali. Her advice is to act like an employee from Day One and you’ll be treated like an employee. In her case, she was hired as one. “Don’t ever pass on a chance to intern at a company you care about if the position is unpaid,” she said. “The experience and the network you gain is a great investment.”

Volunteer work

If you think volunteer work isn’t valuable, think again. Some employers may appreciate this more than anything else, because it can reveal true passion. And again, there’s serious potential for skills development.

Stephanie Smith, an International Development Studies major who graduated from Dalhousie University in 2010, spent one of her summers volunteering part-time with the Halifax Refugee Clinic.  She wrote background research reports on specific countries. Sounds simple enough, but the knowledge she gained then is helping her significantly now, as an ESL instructor at Study English in Canada Inc.

“Culturally, (that research) helps me a lot because I have background information on certain countries,” says Smith.