By: Jennifer Flores
In early August, Dominican students were introduced to Hire Dominican, a new career services platform. This development was meant to replace Handshake, which employers and faculty found difficult to work with. As the shift was being made, students shared their experience navigating the platform.
Kamara Jackson, senior director of career programs and employer relations, explained that the change was thought about 6 months to a year in advance. The decision was made ultimately due to specific needs not being offered on Handshake.
“For us, we made the decision because Handshake did not provide us with the opportunity to make a lot of changes ourselves as staff,” she said. “So, the use became a little bit problematic for employers.”
Another disadvantage of Handshake was the absence of detailed data reports.
“The analytics that we were looking for regarding career and professional successes and outcomes were not there,” she said.
It was found that 12Twenty, a career management and recruitment software platform, provided a more advanced system. Every institution that used this program, also had the option to name or brand their own platform. Overall, it has offered a more personalized system.
The decision to announce it early august was intentional, since to students tend to check their emails less frequently during the summer.
“We timed it so that when students were starting to come back, they would realize,” Jackson said.
“We did also provide some lead in time as well to let students know that if they had documents on the previous platform, that this would be the time for them to extract everything and pull it off.”
Student workers were also involved in this development.
“They were really instrumental with a lot of the administrative tasks that the previous platform offered; we were able to glean some of their feedback as well,” Jackson said.
After the launch of Hire Dominican, other students around campus began to familiarize themselves with this system. Melina Vega and Emily Salazar seemed to have had a positive experience as freshman, new to career exploring.
“I think it is pretty self-explanatory, simple, and easy to understand,” Vega said. “It is very effective in my opinion.“
“It’s easy to navigate, I feel like there’s a lot of tools,” Salazar said. “I’ve only been using it for CV, employer visits, and registering for events, but even finding events is super easy.”
The goal appears to have been met by Jackson’s standards.
“I have seen that students have found that it’s a lot more user friendly,” she said, ” It allows the student to see a lot of information on the web.”
Hire Dominican offers many features including an announcement page, calendar, recommended jobs and events all in one interface. When searching for employers, it allows students to filter their options based on industry and provides demographic information. Students can even see if the employer is a Dominican alumnus.
Despite its easy navigation, seniors who adapted to Handshake were left wondering how the transition would affect their career search options.
Camila Ramirez Guillen admits that Hire Dominican has been easier to navigate compared to Handshake but noticed the lack of opportunities.
“One thing I will say is that Hire Dominican seems to have less internships and jobs compared to Handshake” she said.
“I’m not sure if it’s because they are more careful with their choices or any other reason. I am awaiting to see if more internships and job opportunities show up in Hire Dominican, as I do think it is helpful to have a platform like this as a college student.”
However, Jackson affirmed that students losing opportunities will not be the case.
“12Twenty allows us to be able to do multiple things. We’re able to put all of the employees that are connected to our students in the system,” she said. “Their internship and full-time opportunities will come along with them as well. So, the students will not lose access to opportunities.”
Jackson shares that as a first-generation student herself, she thought about choosing technology that helps students overcome barriers.
“There are more layers to what you guys are experiencing that I didn’t experience,” she said. “If I can do my part and the team can do their part, how do we help students not have to think about that? They can just focus on being great, focus on getting grades, focus on being able to socialize, and why they should be selected over someone else. All those things are important.”
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