Friday, March 28 was not quite homecoming, but many Villanova alumni still returned to campus.
Communication Career Day is an annual event at which students can learn from and network with Villanova alumni who were members of the Communication Department. It is sponsored by Lambda Pi Eta, the official communication honor society of the National Communication Association (NCA).
This year, the event took place from 1 p.m. to 4 p.m. in Garey Hall, the Communication Department’s home base.
Approximately 50 students and nine alumni registered for the event. The event began with introductions and a panel, during which the alumni directly answered some of these questions. Next, students were broken into small groups based upon their career interests for a round robin to speak with the alumni.
“I think, honestly, the best part was the round robin discussion,” junior communication major specializing in PR and advertising Olivia Belasco said. “Getting to talk to different people one-on-one, I think, starting off with a panel and getting to learn a little bit more about each person, and then being able to go and ask them specific questions in groups of three to four people was really helpful.”
Finally, there was an optional networking hour for students to pursue any connections formed in the round robin.
Katie Tuberosa is the Senior Director of Career Day in Lambda Pi Eta. She and her junior co-Chair, Eva Van Der Goes, had a large part in organizing the event.
“We have an alumni base, and there are just tons of communication alumni that want to come back and help support students,” Tuberosa said. There are eight specializations, or disciplines, for communication majors to declare. They are organizational communication, interpersonal and intercultural communication, media production, media studies, journalism, performance studies, rhetorical studies and public relations and advertising. Public relations and advertising has the largest student base of all the specializations.
Some students that attended the Communication Career Day had reported it to be beneficial to their career growth, and eased their post-graduate concerns.
“It really, like, caused me to stop stressing so much about what I am doing,” junior communication major specializing in PR & Advertising Ella Metzler said. “A lot of these members on the panel were saying that they didn’t have a job lined up out of college…they really reassured me that everything works out, everyone finds a job and everyone ends up where they need to be.”
Hannah Logue is a sophomore communication major specializing in PR & Advertising. This was her second time attending Communication Career Day and it will not be her last.
“I feel like I really got more out of it this year than I did last year, and I’m sure that, you know, I’m coming to continue to build on that next year, as well,” Logue said.
Logue had particularly connected with alumna Julia Lull, an Emmy-nominated documentary filmmaker and journalist, and co-Founder at Working Tens Inc. Lull graduated from Villanova in 2013.
Both Logue and Lull connected over their shared experiences being involved with Villanova Television (VTV).
“Without me even asking, she offered that she would love to facilitate some technical workshops,” Logue said. “She was really excited about the idea of coming to us at VTV and putting on workshops to help us deepen our technical knowledge from someone who’s working in the industry…I’m gonna connect with her, really, as soon as I sit down [home] and invite her to the VTV page, and [I’m] really really excited about this opportunity that came about solely because I attended this event.”
Meltzer does wish one thing was done differently.
“The one thing I will say is I wish [Lambda Pi Eta] released information about the panelist members prior to the meeting, just so we could do some research,” Metzler said.
Having Communication Career Day hosted in March aligned well with the internship recruitment period, as well. This provided students with potential opportunities.
Overall, some students have reported they are excited to return to Lambda Pi Eta’s Communication Career Day next year.
