A new career development center will be established at Syracuse University to enhance services offered to graduate and postdoctoral students, a university administrator announced Wednesday.

Peter Vanable, dean of the graduate school, said Dan Olson-Bang, associate director for Graduate Career Services, will be the director of the center. The center supports the Academic Strategic Plan, which outlines major focus areas for the college to develop in both the short- and long-term.

“The Academic Strategic Plan very clearly specified that we want to elevate both the quality and strength of our programs, but also the opportunities of professional development for our students,” Vanable said in a student press briefing on Wednesday.

The services are intended to extend the duties that the current career services offers while adding new responsibilities, Vanable said.

The program, which will be called the Office of Graduate Professional Career Development, will target distinct disciplines and industries via a curriculum-based approach, offering hands-on help and panels for more specific assistance.

Olson-Bang has been the associate director of Graduate Career Services since 2014. He has invited nationally recognized speakers to campus and developed workshops to help students organize their career development paths.

The university’s Academic Strategic Plan, which has been developed under Chancellor Kent Syverud, in part aims to better support graduate students. Vice President for Research John Liu previously told The Daily Orange that an increased focus on securing external grant funding will help better support graduate students, as part of the Academic Strategic Plan. Vanable on Wednesday said the new center is just another component of that effort.

Different colleges at SU have career development centers specific to their school, such as the School of Information Studies, which requires most graduate students to fulfill an internship before receiving their degrees. The Martin J. Whitman School of Management requires all students, undergraduate and graduate, to have an internship.

Last May, the University Senate’s Committee on Student Life reviewed university-wide career services, focusing on making recommendations to improve support for international students, graduate students and those without a college-specific career services center.

The office’s services are now available to graduate students, Vanable said, but new hires and the full scope of the resources should be completely available by next semester.

SU is also currently in the process of developing a new campus-wide career advising model partially funded by the $100 million Invest Syracuse fundraising initiative. It plans to hire more career advisers in the College of Arts and Sciences and College of Visual and Performing Arts, among other schools.

Published on March 21, 2018 at 9:47 pm

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