Where do you see yourself working in the future?

Although Collin Perryman already has his heart set on a major, he decided to check out the Career Exposition on campus anyway.

“It’s helpful because you get to see how your major can work with everyone else’s major,” Perryman, urban planning major, said. “You get to see how a person’s job or interest can help you down the line.”

The Career Exposition was put on and coordinated by the Career Placement Services and took place last Wednesday.

“We have this so we can bring faculty, students and employers together so they can find out information about companies and what they have to offer,” Linda Lew, student services technician, said. “Also students can learn about the difference services and programs here on campus in the academic areas and in student services.”

There were more than 100 participants at the expo with about half of them being employers from companies. Several departments and clubs on campus also participated in the event.

“The majority of students at El Camino College are undeclared majors, so what I’m here to do is to tell them about the program,” Bob Diaz, electronics and computer hardware technology instructor, said.

Diaz said that students may come up to get information, which sometimes sparks an interest in a field new to them.

“Not everyone is into electronics or into computers, but there are a lot of students who might come by and say, ‘Oh, I never thought about it.’ And it’s a pretty good field out there in terms of electronics technology and computer technology,” he said.

For the students who weren’t necessarily searching for a career path or a major, but just a part-time job, many opportunities were also available.

“This is a chance where employers have the time to talk to students and they want them to ask questions,” Lew said. “Students can brush up on their interviewing skills and find out about different companies and what they have to offer.”

Many employers were at the expo with positions available, ready to accept applications and hire students.

“Even though they don’t have anything related to the medical field, I might still give the shipping company a try just because I need a part-time job,” Stephanie Baik, biology major, said.

To help students gain employment opportunities, Career Placement Services came up with a new idea: It set up a corner in the Activities Center with laptops and printers so students could create a resume on the spot to hand to the employers.

“We used to send the students upstairs to the labs during the expo, then they’d have to come back down to hand in the resumes,” Lew said. “So we thought why not bring the lab to them?”

Although the resume corner did not have as many takers as the student services technicians had hoped, they were still pleased with the outcome.

“Many students didn’t know about it and didn’t get to use it, so next year, we will make sure to publicize it more so that more students can take advantage of it,” Lew said.

Students who did not have majors walked in to the expo and left with new ideas of the possibilities for their future while others, like Perryman, walked away with a more adamant view of their goals.

“I was at the architectural booth and saw how it could work with urban planning and I even found out about some schools I could go to,” Perryman said. “The expo helped a lot to confirm things.”