New Career Center Opens at SENMC

By Misty Cryer

Pilot workshops will begin this month at a new Career Center at Southeast New Mexico College. Preparations in motion include collaborations and evaluations of resources to best serve the college students and the community through the center.

“We will be launching it completely in the fall,” said Rocio Esparza, Director of Grant Services and Special Projects. “For now, we are only doing pilot workshops, such as mock interviews, resume workshops, how to dress professionally…workshops that are going to help our students.”

The first workshop, Interview/Soft Skills, is scheduled for 4-5 p.m. on Tuesday, April 28, with the second one, Cover Letter/Resume, occurring 4-5 p.m. on Thursday, April 30, according to Esparza. The workshops will take place in the Learning Technology Center (LTC) in Room 211. “We are partnering up with America’s Job Center in New Mexico,” she said.

Services offered through the

Career Center will be completely free for students, Esparza said. “Through the Career Center, we want our students to be sure that before they graduate, they know how to present themselves out in the real world, so they don’t have a hard time looking for employment,” she said.

Students who wish to sign up for the workshops can visit the Grant Services Department, where Saul Navarette, Career Center Coordinator, can assist them, said Esparza. She said Navarette is in charge of coordinating the workshops, promoting them to ensure students know about them, and determining what is needed to best prepare students to enter the workforce.

With the intentions of the Career Center being a pipeline from the college to the real world, Esparza said contacts with employers in the community will be made to identify resources for career preparedness for students. Partnerships with community employers and industries will help ensure that the students at the college are funneling through the college into the workforce, she said.

“We are partnering up with Dr. [Monty] Harris,” said Esparza, explaining that he is the Dean of Work-Based Learning. “He is going to be helping us to connect with the workforce industries,” she said, adding oilfield and energy companies as examples of fields that students may consider going into.

Future workshops are expected to include anything that involves career preparedness, Esparza said, using Microsoft workshops as an example.

Currently, aptitude tests are administered through student services to assist students in career selection, she said. “We are looking into different kinds of programs that we can purchase to see how we can better service our students and kind of guide them in what they need to do,” she added.

Using an example of a student choosing business as a career, then deciding after taking business classes that it is not for them, Esparza said they want to be prepared to advise students through the Career Center in matching qualities and interests to trades for consideration, along with providing options.

The Career Center Coordinator and the full Grant Services department currently staff the Career Center. With about 17 people in the department, Esparza said they can guide students in evaluating options and choosing the path they want to take to prepare for a career.

“We are working very hard to make sure that we serve our community,” said Esparza. “We would be happy to get feedback to see what else we need to do and what changes we need to make to make sure that we service not only our students, but our community members as well, so they can be successful.”