Written by: Corina Chen and the CareerVillage.org Team

“CareerVillage has helped me answer the questions that came to my mind that I didn’t think reading a book would be able to answer in the specificity I needed.”

-Augusta

Augusta first joined CareerVillage in 2013 when she was in high school and first started thinking about college.

“All of a sudden, it was like: ‘you need to go to college’. I thought to myself ‘what! I’ve never kind of heard about this up until the moment where it was pertinent’. I started looking online, Googling ‘college help’, ‘college advice’, ‘how do I prepare’, ‘what do you do in college’. And then I came across CareerVillage and I thought it was perfect — they don’t need too much information from me and I could ask questions to people from different walks of life. At that point it wasn’t enough to just say ‘go to college’, but instead I needed to know the steps to get there.”

Her drive was impressive from the start as she asked about multiple STEM majors and how to receive a PhD. She wanted to make sure that as a woman of color, she’d be able to succeed and feel represented in the STEM field. She asked CareerVillage about these concerns and learned about extraordinary female leaders from women in the field and companies prioritizing diversity from HBCU alumni. To Augusta, the perspective she found on CareerVillage was invaluable.

“At some point my counselor couldn’t answer the specific questions that were more important to me because she didn’t have the experience or view point. I was talking to someone who couldn’t give me the answers I needed and I didn’t know where else to go to find those answers. I needed someone to give me their perspective, having gone to an HBCU or having looked into one because I didn’t have the ability to travel and go visit one and talk to students. CareerVillage was my way to talk to the people who had that experience.”

Augusta got accepted into a university in Colorado and returned to CareerVillage throughout her studies to help her overcome obstacles, such as failing an exam, and identify growth opportunities, like pursuing extracurriculars, and how to turn her degree into a meaningful career.

“CareerVillage helped me to explore what else is out there in terms of what I can do with my degree and normalize the sense that you can do what you love and this can guide where you’re going to go. You don’t have to stick to one thing. I asked what you can do with a degree in computer science other than be a programmer or software engineer. I wanted to know how I could balance this interest with other things I like so I wasn’t overwhelmed. From the professionals on CareerVillage, I learned that you can volunteer to teach others computer science. For me, I thought that was perfect because I like working with kids in STEM, but I don’t want to program every day — that’s not for me, but I still also want to make sure that I’m in that tech space. It was great to know how to accomplish a balance and not just live and breath computer science.”

Augusta’s questions over the next few years show her career preparation progressing throughout college, from asking about internships to receiving certifications to structuring her resume. She graduated from college in 2020 as prepared as possible to enter the world of work, but was faced with navigating a pandemic economy. As always, she turned to CareerVillage.

“Everyone had said that 2020 was the best year to be graduating and everyone would be fine, but all of a sudden it just came crashing down. It was good to hear about people from different professions on CareerVillage in addition to those that graduated in 2008, when there was a recession. This was super comforting to me and important to hear because I felt like I had just done all this work for nothing and that was really hard.”

Augusta received encouragement and confidence from professionals on CareerVillage. All of which has been pivotal in her overcoming the difficulties Covid-19 presented and ultimately landing a job offer as a Technology Analyst at Deloitte.

“CareerVillage has helped me answer the questions that came to my mind that I didn’t think reading a book would be able to answer in the specificity I needed. It gave me the option to hear a lot of opinions on how people view things. It shaped the choices I made and my mindset in going to school and getting a job.”

Augusta knows this is just the start of her career and that she can turn to CareerVillage at any point along the way.

“I think CareerVillage will help me going forward in terms of talking to other professionals in the technology field on how to negotiate, handle specific situations, and make the leap from your first job to another job. It will help me be more established in the industry I want to be in.”

Augusta’s journey is one of millions of other students who are seeking career guidance on CareerVillage.org. If you’d like to join this movement or learn how your company can contribute to the massive impact CareerVillage is making, please email hello@careervillage.org.