#ItAllAddsUp

Next week the #ItAllAddsUp campaign will start here at Brock. The It All Adds Up campaign encourages students to figure out how they are making their university experience all add up to the career of their dreams in order to inspire other students to pursue their goals with everything they've got! As students, we all know classes, assignments, and grades are very important as far as our overall career goals. But there are many other things that we are doing as students outside of the classroom as well that truly make a huge impact on achieving our career goals and personal aspirations. Essentially, everything we are doing is all adding up!!

From volunteering to going abroad for a semester, to attending campus events or workshops, there are SO many ways students at Brock and other universities can add to their skills gained from their degrees! If you happen to be a Brock student, utilizing Experience BU to stay on top of upcoming events, workshops, and on-campus happenings will allow you to not miss out on the experiences that matter the most to you! And on top of this, we even have a way to track how you are making your experiences all add up through the Experience Plus Co-Curricular Transcript!

So now it's your turn to tell us how YOU are making it all add up by visiting our booths around campus next week:

Booth Times/Locations
November 2 - Computer Commons - 9-11
November 3 - Computer Commons - 1-3
November 4 - MC A Hallway - 9-11
November 5 - Computer Commons - 9 - 2
November 6 - MC A Hallway - 9-11

Can't make it to any of these booth times? No problem! This campaign is also accessible for students to participate in virtually! Take a picture of yourself showing how you are making it all add up and use the hashtag #ItAllAddsUp and #BrockU on social media (Instagram/Twitter/Facebook) to inspire fellow Brock students and students from other universities across Canada to get involved and pursue their goals with passion and integrity! Click here to check out the It All Adds Up website for even more details on this campaign!

Oh - one last request:

Don't forget to like us on Facebook & follow us on Twitter and Instagram! By clicking these hyperlinks, your only a few steps away from connecting with us and there's nothing that excites us more!

Have a great day everyone!

Scarlet Stark
Sr. Career Assistant
Psychology Major 

Thank You

This post is all about saying thanks! We began the Brock Career Services blog June 2011 and later we were lucky enough to be recognized in 2012 as one of the top 10 college and universities campus career blogs. Our success is all thanks to the 344,739 individuals who have stopped by our page and gave us a follow, commented or just stopped by to read our posts. We cannot thank you all enough for making this possible. Right from the bottom our career hearts, thank you.

As a result of our success and popularity, we have been making more posts on our Instagram (@brockcareerserv), Twitter (@brockcareerserv) and our Facebook page (@brockcareerserv). On these platforms we post about upcoming events, job application tips, internships, volunteering and much more! It would mean the world to us if everyone who loves our blog would share the love on our other social media platforms as well. We are looking to spread career knowledge with as many people we can.

Thank you so much again, and our team will continue working to improve blog and social media presence as well as helping out Brock University students, community members, and faculty.

Thank you (had to say it one more time)

Tyler Harris

Senior Career Assistant

(Instagram)@brockcareerserv

(Twitter)    @brockcareerserv

(Facebook) @brockcareerserv

Top 5 Benefits of Creating a 'Master Resume'

A 'Master Resume' is a document that allows you to put every single career-related experience you can put on a resume onto a master document. The reason for doing this is to have everything you have ever done on a single document that includes a detailed explanation of the skills you developed during each experience; you are not limited by any page limit or word count and have the ability to put as many bullet points as possible for each experience. Creating a 'Master Resume' is a daunting task for anyone, but it is worthwhile and highly rewarding. Here are the top 5 benefits of creating a 'Master Resume'.

1. Allows you to quickly, and better tailor your resume for each job application

Job applications typically list a set of skills and experiences that they want their 'ideal' candidate to have. Sometimes it is easy to say that you have that skill, but actually listing everywhere where you have demonstrated that skills is crucial. With a 'Master Resume' you can have multiple bullet points for each position identifying different skills for each experience, so you can better identify your qualifications. It also allows for a much easier 'copy and paste' experience when tailoring your resume for each experience, as you can pick individual bullet points for each position to better address their qualifications.

2. Prepares you well for any job interview

Doing a full analysis of your skills and experiences prepares you well for almost any question, helps to answer the most dreaded and likely question of "tell me about yourself," and more importantly gives you confidence in your abilities. Instead of being caught off-guard when they ask you about your strengths and weaknesses, you can tackle that question knowing the full breadth of your skills and experiences.

3. A self-assessment in its own right

More of a soft benefit, a 'Master Resume' is a self-assessment in its own right. It puts everything in perspective in terms of what you have done, the skills and experiences you have gained, and your career pathway of start to present. It also better answers the question of 'what is your personal brand' as it allows you to begin to understand exactly what your personal brand is and how to further your brand. I'd encourage you to read our blog post about personal branding here and the importance of knowing yourself here.

4. Identifies gaps in skills and experiences

As much as it identifies skills, it also identifies gaps in skills and weaknesses - a perfect opportunity for you to fill those gaps! Knowing exactly what you have done will also tell you what you have not done, and you can then address those gaps and better yourself before that big job interview. 

5. It will help you create a better LinkedIn profile

LinkedIn in a lot of ways is like an online portfolio that identifies all of your relevant skills and experiences. Having a full in-depth knowledge of all your skills and experiences will help you create a better LinkedIn profile. You can have better SEO (search engine optimization) by identifying skills and experiences on your LinkedIn that you may not include on every resume you send out. Think of your 'Master Resume' as your LinkedIn profile template.

Anthony Mancuso

4th Year Honours Bachelor of Sport Management

Lead Career Assistant 

Career Cruising – the kick start to your career development!

After working at Career Services for a few years, I know how important it is to start your career development with assessment. Self-exploration and assessment are critical first steps in finding the right career for you. Although we have a lot of great self-assessment resources for students at Career Services, I want to focus today on one of my favourites, Career Cruising.

Career Cruising is an online assessment tool that anyone can use to help them find some direction. When a student comes in and says that they don’t know which careers they should be considering, I know they are still in the assessment stage of career planning. There are so many helpful resources that Career Cruising offers within their online site. Below I have taken apart the different categories that the Matchmaker Assessment has. If you complete the Matchmaker Assessment you will be able to see all of these categories for each career result from the assessment.

At a Glance: This section gives you a brief description of what this job is, summarizing all the information in the further categories.

Suitable for You?: This section displays (based on the questions you answered) why it came up in your Matchmaker results. You can see why and why not this career would suit you.

Job Description: This section holds an in depth explanation of what this job is. If you are seriously considering that career, reading all of this will be very helpful.

Working Conditions: This section is important to look at so you can recognize what the working conditions are for the career you are investigating. For example it will talk about the hazards of positions, times that you work, etc.

Earnings: This section tells you how much you will make as salary according to Canadian stats.

Education: This section is very important to note so you can see if you are on the right educational track. In this section you can browse different schools throughout Canada that offer programs that would coincide with that specific career.

Sample Career Path: In this section you will see a lifetime career sample. Most careers are broken down into Beginner, Intermediate and Senior levels so you can see how your income and role will develop over time.

Related Careers: This section holds a list of other careers that relate to the one you are looking at.

Other Resources: This section has a list of other resources you can explore that go beyond the information on Career Cruising. These are great ways to learn more about careers.

My last bit of advice is to explore, explore, explore! Also, don’t be afraid to take the assessment more than once, we are constantly changing individuals. This website offers so much information for people on their career journey. You can access Career Cruising by going to careerzone.brocku.ca and signing in with your Brock student username and password. 

Alysha-Lynn Kooter

Lead Career Assisant

4th Year Intermediate/Senior Concurrent Education - Visual Arts Major

Track Your Experiences!

Now that we are a few weeks into school, I'm sure many of you have had the opportunity to attend a campus event or activity, sign up for a club, or maybe you've started volunteering already! But did you know you can track these experiences too?

Well the secret is out! You totally can track your experiences! And not just in one way, but TWO ways!

Want more details? Then keep reading!

Experience Plus is Brock's co-curricular transcript program and the first of it's kind here at Brock! Not only can you track your experiences (which include on-campus jobs, volunteer hours, awards/certificates, professional development and workshops), but you can also earn a certificate for your volunteer hours through Volunteer Plus (for more info, click here), as well as get your official transcript printed which includes ALL of the experiences you've inputted that are verified. To get started, head to my.brocku.ca/portal/ then go to the Student Self Serve menu. The tab on the left that says "Career Services" is where you would go to track your experiences (under "Student Data") and request your transcript to be printed. The transcript can be presented to employers to highlight your involvement and is also a great addition to a career portfolio!

Experience BU is Brock's student involvement portal and is the best place to find out about upcoming events and activities happening around campus and within the region as a whole. And not only does Experience BU provide you with event details and local happenings, you can also track your experiences through the Campus Wide Co-Curriculum which encompasses different facets of experiences, from Arts & Culture to Career Prep (which we can help you with!).  Click here to explore the different curricula you can complete, as well as events and activities which you can track on your Co-Curricular transcript!

Now that you are in the "know" of how to track all that you do here at Brock, why not get started! If you would like our help with anything, please stop by the Career Resource Centre and speak with one of our student staff! We are all trained on how to use both Experience Plus and Experience BU and can help you navigate these platforms successfully!

Have a great day Badgers!

Scarlet Stark
Sr. Career Assistant
Psychology Major