I Heard... I’m Supposed to Join a “Professional Club.” What?

Sometimes these are called “student groups,” sometimes they’re called “career preparation groups” and sometimes they’re called “professional clubs.” Whatever you want to call them, these are organizations that are usually run by students (with the help of school official that acts as a sponsor or a administrator for that group) that focuses on preparing you for your post-college life. What does this mean?

Characteristic Focused

These groups are open to folks of specific religious, ethnic/racial or even geographic backgrounds! These tend to be the most broad, and focus on providing both a social and career component to their networking mixers. This is a good option if you want to meet other people that have you have something in common with but also want to leverage a very general group of alumni for networking purposes. An example of a group like this could be the: Berkeley Chinese Students and Scholars Association

Industry Focused

So maybe you don't really know what career you want to have after you graduate, but you know that you would like a career in the major that you’ve chosen. If this is the case for you, then industry-focused organizations are for you! These organizations specialize in providing networking and preparation for students who want a guidance or networking opportunities in their major, but aren’t quite sure what specific role they want. An example of a group like this could be the: UCLA Undergraduate Business Society

Career Focused

These are groups that focus on specific careers that can partner with existing majors offered on campus. For example, students who might be interested in majoring in business might want to specify their career focus and join the accounting student organization so that they can get an inside track during recruiting (specifically focusing on roles that are for accountants instead of general business majors). An example of a group like this could be the: Teachers for Tomorrow Club at UC Irvine

It also might be beneficial to look at some of the Greek life (sororities or fraternities) that are available on your campus! Many of them are professionally or community service driven, or co-ed. When choosing an organization, you will likely get the most “bang for your buck” if you choose an organization that has many chapters across the country/world. This allows you to expand your network exponentially (and the large size of the organization may draw more businesses to recruit from them). In fact, some of these organizations actually partner with larger, official professional organizations to host chapters on campuses across the nation. Some examples of these are the American Institute of Architecture Students , American Medical Students Association, American Society of Mechanical Engineers, American Marketing Association, Net Impact (which promotes social responsibility in business) and many, many more!