Unfortunately, as a student that is still in their undergraduate career, it isn’t typical for someone like me to know that they want to be in Student Affairs at such a young time. Student Affairs is a graduate study. The advantages to knowing that I want to join this field is that I get the opportunities to go to conferences (as I recently did as 1 of 5 selected undergraduate students to attend), network, and get myself out there. It is important to network as early as possible because the one thing I hear the most from professionals within this field is, “It’s all about the people you know.”
This is an important realization. It is all about the people I know, but I gain the trust of those people by showing that have an adequate knowledge of the field, what these jobs are looking for, and what skills I have that can be beneficial if I were to take a Student Affairs job one day. Because of this, I did more research into exactly what student affairs is and what types of jobs are available in the field, and I was surprised to learn even more than what I had already know.
Student Affairs and Higher Education are fields that offer a lot of opportunity. There are so many different types of jobs that can really fit the interest of just about any person that loves working with students, helping out, and sharing their expertise. These jobs range from working in the Career Development Center, helping students understand what they might what to do in the future to working in the Financial Aid office helping students pay their tuition and understand how to manage the funds that they are receiving from the state or government, to student involvement and working directly with student leaders and organizations on recruitment and tips on how to succeed. And I began to realize that this is why I really love the field I intend to join, because there are so many different things that I can do, that I don’t see myself getting bored.
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