Real Learning Experiences: Farming, Fishing, Fighting Fires Accelerated Learning Resources

Real Learning Experiences: Farming, Fishing, Fighting Fires

By Scott Shrum

Soon another wave of college seniors will start looking for work as their graduation date nears—a troubling fact given that so many Class of 2010 grads are reportedly still looking for meaningful jobs. Add in the tens of thousands undergrads who will seek summer internships, and the job market for the sub-23-year-old crowd looks very crowded, indeed.

But some savvy college students will zig when everyone else is zagging. While many of your peers and classmates may be obsessed with landing a coveted summer internship with a blue-chip firm that looks and smells like the all-important work you think you’ll be doing by the time you’re 25, I would argue that you may be better off serving as a summer firefighter in Nevada or a deckhand on a fishing boat in Alaska. Or even a farmhand on an organic farm.

“But what will my parents say?” you ask. “How does my college education lend itself to this kind of work?”

Perhaps you’re not actually asking those questions, but I bet your first reaction was to curl your lip when I suggested those jobs, as if I had just offered you some month-old milk. But if you did react that way, then you may be overlooking the true value of a summer internship: learning experiences and outcomes. Understanding what constitutes a valuable professional learning experience vs. what traditional wisdom suggests “looks good on a résumé” could help your résumé stand out and give you terrific stories to tell in your job interviews down the road.

Here’s something that many college students don’t realize about summer internships: The hiring managers you will encounter are seldom impressed by the specific tasks that you did in those jobs. They know that they themselves rarely give their own summer interns very important work, and assume that the work you did in a desk job is equally unimportant. They expect that, regardless of what summer jobs you’ve held, they will need to teach you virtually everything you need to know to be a meaningful contributor in their firm. While you go on and on about how you used Microsoft Excel to build a customer database in your summer job, the interviewer is really wondering, “Is this kid bright and hard-working enough to excel in this position? What will happen the first time he or she encounters a setback or an unpleasant task?” That’s what they really want to know, because to them, you’re a blank slate almost no matter what jobs you’ve done until now.

Hiring managers really want to hear stories and examples that tell them you’re not easily daunted, that you’re willing to do the grunt work when it needs to be done (and trust me, most entry-level jobs worth having will have their share of grunt work), and that you have the potential to grow in your role. If they can spot these strong raw characteristics in you, then they’ll be willing to teach you everything else you need to know to do well in the position.

That’s where firefighting, fishing and tilling come in. While they may seem like down-and-dirty jobs that won’t get you any closer to your career goals, think of the stories you’ll be able to tell after having served in these positions. Imagine how well those stories will demonstrate the traits I just described. And get ready to answer questions like, “Wow, what was it like to work on a fishing boat?” because I guarantee you that your interviewer will want to know. Draw upon some stories from your unusual internship to demonstrate those traits of a promising young hire, and I guarantee you that you will have a leg up on all of those students who did nothing more than keep a seat warm in a cubicle last summer.

—Scott Shrum is director of M.B.A. admissions research at Veritas Prep, a test-prep and admissions consulting firm. He is a regular contributor to Hire Education.

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