5 Things to Do Before Classes Start in the Fall
5 Things to Do Before Classes Start in the Fall
Most students spend the last weeks of summer doing nothing career-related. Here is what to do instead.
The week before move-in tends to go one of two ways. Some students spend it refreshing social media and rewatching shows they have already seen. Others use it to set themselves up for a semester that actually goes somewhere. The difference between those two groups is usually visible by October.
None of what is on this list takes more than a few hours. But most students skip all of it, which is exactly why doing it puts you ahead.
Update your resume before you step foot on campus
Whatever you did this summer belongs on your resume before fall recruiting starts. A summer job, a volunteer role, a freelance project, a GWI program. Add it now while the details are fresh. Fall recruiting at major companies opens in September and some deadlines hit in October. If you wait until you are settled into your dorm to think about your resume, you are already behind the students who updated theirs in August.
Make a list of five people you want to meet this semester
These can be professors, professionals in your field, alumni at companies you want to work at, or upperclassmen in your major who already have internships. Write down five names or five types of people before you move back in. Having a list makes it concrete. Most students say they want to network and then never reach out to anyone specific because they did not decide in advance who that would be.
Look up your university's career center hours and book an appointment
Career centers tend to be packed in October when everyone realizes recruiting is happening. If you book your resume review or mock interview appointment in the first week of September, you get a slot before the rush and your materials are polished when applications open. Most students do not go to their career center at all. Walking in with a booked appointment before week two of the semester puts you in a very small group.
Clean up your LinkedIn before anyone sees it
Recruiters look at LinkedIn before they look at anything else. If your profile photo is a cropped group picture, your headline still says "Student at [University]," and your experience section is empty, that is what a recruiter sees when they search your name after reading your resume. Spend one afternoon adding a clean headshot, writing a two-sentence summary of what you do and what you are looking for, and filling in what you did this summer. It takes less time than people think and the difference it makes on a recruiter's first impression is significant.
Decide which organizations on campus you are actually joining this year
Fall involvement fairs happen in the first two weeks of classes and most students sign up for everything, attend nothing, and wonder why their resume still looks thin in the spring. Pick two organizations that genuinely connect to what you want to do after graduation, and commit to showing up consistently. A leadership role or active membership in one relevant club is worth more on a resume than five clubs you attended once. Decide before you get there so you are not just signing up for email lists at the involvement fair.
Fall semester moves fast. Midterms arrive before most students have figured out their schedule, and recruiting deadlines do not wait for you to feel settled. The students who land interviews in October are almost always the ones who did the groundwork before classes started, not during them.
How the GWI Career Accelerator Fits Into This
If you want to go into fall with more than just an updated resume, GWI's Career Accelerator is an online, five-week program that builds the skills behind a strong application cycle. Personal branding, strategic communication, networking, and workplace execution, free this fall with code GWI26. The kind of preparation that makes the resume update actually land.
Young women who complete the Career Accelerator go into recruiting season knowing how to talk about themselves, how to build professional relationships before they need them, and how to show up in a way that gets them remembered. All of that is worth more than a last-minute resume polish the night before a deadline.
Every semester either builds on the last one or makes up for it. The students who come back with an updated resume, a clean LinkedIn, and a list of people they want to meet are not lucky. They just did five things in August that everyone else skipped. You have time to do all of them before move-in.
Go into fall with more than just new classes.
GWI's Career Accelerator is an online, five-week program that builds the skills to land your first opportunity and succeed once you are in it. For a limited time, registration is FREE with Promo Code GWI26.