Nursing students flood out Loyalist's Career Fair

By Shelby Wye

FEB. 7TH, 2013, LOYALIST COLLEGE: Kaysi Cooney, left, and Taylor Smith, right, showing off all their pamphlets they gathered from this Thursday’s career fair. The nursing students hope to get a job from one of these employers after leaving the fair. (Photo by Shelby Wye)

Nursing students flooded the booths of the Loyalist College career fair this past Thursday. They were seeking for possible employment amongst the wide variety of personal support worker careers, including long-term care facilities and home-care companies.

There were 70 plus employer booths at this semester’s career fair, varying from local businesses, provincial corporations and universities.  Nursing facilities dominated the one half of the gym.

Students in the program, donning their slick black Nursing Program jackets, prowled through their future employers territory. With stacks of papers, pamphlets and business cards in their hands, questions buzzed through the career fair.

For nursing students, Kaysi Cooney and Taylor Smith, this career fair was the perfect chance to find a place to go after they graduate in June.

“The booth workers are very nice, giving us all this information and their contacts,” said Smith, “I’ll probably walk away today, go home, and start applying to these jobs right away.”

“We wouldn’t find these people without this career fair. Not only the job positions, but also the different companies. I haven’t even heard of some of these retirement homes, or placements, before coming here. It’s really giving me a lot more to apply to,” said Cooney.

This would be their first official step into the nursing career, other than their former placements during the program. They hope that this career fair will have employers walking away remembering their names.

Linda Facey , director of care of Moira Place, has been part of the fair for four years.

Moira Place takes in many nursing students during their placement periods, but she says that they are also interested in hiring them as soon as they graduate from Loyalist College.

“We’re here to put ourselves out to this community, and are accepting resumes that students give us. We have a lot already,” said Facey, “We’re in Tweed, which is a small community, so for us to find students, we have to go where they are.”

Loyalist College hosts two career fairs a year, one for the fall and the winter semester. This semester, the career centre worked with the Public Relations students of Loyalist College to really promote the event.

Jennifer Monje was one of the Public Relations students who helped to run the event. Manning the front booth, she helped the employers to register in that morning.

“Everything went really smoothly. They were happy to be here to see what sort of students Loyalist had to offer. It’s already starting to get really crowded, and it’s only eleven,” she said. The fair ran from 10 am to 1 pm.

Some companies aren’t looking for the career-seekers, but rather, the in-betweeners. Stream representative, Katherine Malo-Blouin, said that the local call centre is the perfect opportunity to make some money while pursuing a career in another field.

While there are long-term employees of Belleville’s Stream plant, Malo-Blouin said there are many students who come for night or weekend shifts.