Ball State holds its Cardinal Job Fair twice a year in spring and fall semester. On Feb. 19, Ball State has its spring cardinal job fair in Worthen Arena.
There were more than 100 employers including Fortune Globe 500 at this job fair. There were thousands of job and internship opportunities for students from all majors. The Cardinal Job Fair is an opportunity for both Ball State students and employers from hundreds of companies.
“Every year we came to Ball State to find qualified students, and this year is doing good so far” said Lerenzo Domondo from Consolidated Electrical Distributors (CED). “We actually have couple students signed up for the interviews in the first hour, and we are on campus tomorrow for interviews.”
Rachel Landis is a senior marketing major student. This is her second time coming to the Cardinal Job Fair. She went to the last one, but thought she didn’t prepare well enough. She said she felt very nervous because that was her first career fair. She felt she did much better at this year’s event.
“There are very open and just coming up to me, and asking me instead of feeling nervous to go up to them,” Landis said. “They are very welcoming this year.”
While there are many students taking advantage of the Cardinal Job Fair, some students also felt the job fair didn’t help them at all, and many of the international
students have such a view. Xinyan He, a senior student who is major in Business Administration, didn’t plan to find a job or an internship in United States. She didn’t think this job fair helped her a lot. But she had to come anyway. “My professor required me to come to this event, so I have to come here to get my credits,” He said.
At the same time, Yinshuo Huang, who has the same major as He. said this is her first time coming to the job fair, and she had no ideas what she was going to do here. She felt very nervous to talk with those companies, because she said she was afraid that those companies wouldn’t have much interest in her since she is an internationals student. “I’m actually afraid of talking to them, but my professor asked me to come here to get some experiences,” Huang said.
There are also some international students who want to find a full-time job or internship through this job fair. Mengjie Yuan, a graduate student from the Miller college of Business, planned to find a full-time job because she was going to graduate in May. But the job fair did not help with her as much as she had hoped.
“I don’t think this job fair is good for international students,” Yuan said, “If you talk with them, and you’ve gotten a lot of information, but at last they said we don’t sponsor a visa for you that was very embarrassed.” Yuan said she talked to about five companies and none of them sponsor a visa for international students. She said that she hoped the job fair can offer this information earlier so she didn’t have to waste time to talk to those companies. Also, if possible, Yuan wanted the job fair to provide more chances for international students.
Although job fair has some rooms for improvement especially for international students, the job fair is helpful for Ball State students overall. The cardinal job fair contributes to Ball State University's 93 percent career placement rate which is a leading percentage among comparative schools. In order to provide more job and internship information for students, the Ball State Career center has its new app called Career Fair Plus.
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