Career Services
Students uncertain about their majors or students ready to explore the life and career implications of their identified majors should consider consulting an advisor in the Filene Center. Staff members assist students seeking out-of-class learning opportunities, service learning, jobs and summer stipends, in addition to helping students explore the life and career implications of a range of academic choices.
Since its inception in 1986, the Filene Center has assisted students in the pursuit of meaningful out-of-classroom experiences. The center’s goals are for students to discover and make connections among their academic, co-curricular, civic and professional interests. Students work with the Filene Center in multiple ways through individual advising, workshops, information sessions and peer mentors. During advising conversations, students gain an understanding of their goals, skills and strengths, and next steps. To support advising, students can also utilize the career resource library Web-based career learning tool kit and discuss careers with alumnae/i.
Learning from experience. Learning from experience provides Wheaton students with the opportunity to preview potential career paths, experience “real world” connections to their course work, choose their academic majors and minors with greater discernment, and learn more about their emerging interests, strengths and values. Whether undertaken during summers, winter breaks or incorporated into the academic year, internships, jobs and community service enable students to experience and learn from the world beyond Wheaton. Students partner with staff to explore opportunities in a wide variety of organizations, including museums, hospitals, newspapers, social service organizations, government agencies, brokerage houses and television stations. Through this advising partnership, students learn to reflect upon and connect their interests and values to future career and educational choices.
By developing a relationship with advisors early and continuing to meet with them often, students can integrate experiences with their academic interests, and build a portfolio of skills and relevant activities to successfully pursue graduate school and employment opportunities.
Summer stipends. With the support of foundations, alumnae/i and college funds, the Filene Center administers several competitions, which award students stipends of from $3000 to $5000 to students who devise their own summer internships, service experiences, and/or structured independent research in the United States and abroad. Additionally, students can apply to funded summer programs to work as English as a Second Language instructors and camp counselors in Turkey and summer counselor positions working with inner-city youth in Providence, Rhode Island.
Balfour/Community/Trustee Scholars. Some students arrive as merit scholars to Wheaton and have a summer stipend designated for use during the summer immediately following their sophomore or junior year. The Filene Center collaborates with these students to explore options for how they can use their stipend to support their summer experiences
Off-campus job location. The Filene Center collects local and regional off-campus job postings for summer and term-time employment. Filene Center staff partner with students to explore part-time and/or seasonal summer job options, and students can attend thematic workshops offered throughout the academic year pertaining to part-time and summer job search strategies.
Workshops and Web-based resources. The Filene Center offers workshops throughout the year on such topics as self-exploration, résumé writing, researching, interviewing, and job-hunting techniques and strategies. Students can develop and refine their career and life planning skills through frequent workshop attendance and use of the center’s Web-based career learning tool kit (wheatoncollege.edu/Filene).
Gertrude Adams Professional Development Program. This program began in 1988 to provide students with a comprehensive approach to examining life and career choices. Projects and activities include programs such as “Major Connections,” a series of career panels that bring Wheaton alumnae/i back to campus to talk about the links between their college academic major areas of study and their professions. Additionally, there is an alumnae/i Filene Center Liaison Network in selected cities nationwide to assist seniors and graduates with their relocation and career networking. The Gertrude Adams Professional Development Program is underwritten with the generous support of a Wheaton alumna and trustee in honor of her mother. Visit the Filene Center online at wheatoncollege.edu/filene.