Career Ready Guide
Case Study
How Career Director Sarah Kersey Otto multiplied her campus impact with the Career Ready Guide
“It is an answer to something that we have all been grappling with for years. Give it a shot, get your students in there to try it, because we really think it’s going to make a positive difference overall with our students.”
— Sarah Kersey Otto, Career Director
For 10 years, Sarah Kersey Otto and her team have struggled with how to reach more students with their small staff. They simply don’t have the wingspan they need to impact as many students as they’d like to.
“Our staff was really stumped. We knew there was a body of information to teach; we just didn’t have all that information in modules that we could roll out to students in an efficient and cost-effective manner. So this was our answer! It has been the answer to our prayers, really.” By using the Career Ready Guide, Sarah can now reach far more students with the same staff and resources.
Sarah coordinated with individual faculty to bring the guide to classes on campus. She reached out specifically to faculty who teach professional development and those interested in co-curricular learning. Those faculty then incorporated the guide into their classes as coursework. This year Eastern Michigan used the guide with student employees, two communications classes, and in the College of Business.
95%
of Eastern Michigan students now recognize the importance of further developing their career ready competencies after completing the Career Ready Guide
“Now we’re starting to see people say ‘Oh wait, how do I become part of that? How do I get access?’ And so, be patient with it. If you don’t have the opportunity to do a full-scale campus wide roll out, then get your little pockets of people that you know are supportive and let it do its thing.”