Aroostook Aspirations Initiative recently hosted it's fifth annual Scholar Weekend at Northern Maine Community College.

The 2017 Scholars experienced two days full of workshops where they learned about such things as the importance of financial planning, proper appearance and demeanor during an interview, and issues facing Aroostook County. During the weekend, the scholars were introduced to business leaders and professionals from around Aroostook County and were able to not only learn from them, but to network and talk about possible future employment opportunities.

According to Sandy Gauvin, President of Aroostook Aspirations Initiative, “This was another successful Scholar Weekend.  The scholars were engaged and learned skills and information that would help ensure their future career success.  I was amazed at how these scholars had matured in the year since their last scholar weekend.  They are very tuned in to their futures and are working hard to guarantee a great start to the rest of their lives.”

In addition to other activities, scholars participated in a Resume Round Robin in which business professionals and human resource directors reviewed the scholars' resumes and gave tips on how to perfect them for possible job applications down the road.  Each professional worked with a group of 2-3 scholars for 12 minutes, then the groups rotated.  Every scholar got to visit the five  stations, thus ensuring a professional resume.

From there, scholars continued with Speed Interviews, where the same professionals and leaders provided a real-life experience in the interviewing process.  For twelve minutes, scholars went through a mock interview with each of the five business professionals, then rotated to the next station. Again, the scholars were able to receive many sound tips on the best practices in interviewing.

Leadership training was a vigorous, yet popular session during which the scholars worked singly and in groups to identify the 5 most predominant issues in Aroostook County.  These issues could be either positive or negative.  Afterwards, the scholars met with county leaders to discuss the identified issues or to identify other issues in Aroostook County and figure out some solutions.

Many other sessions provided information on topics such as Loans and Credit, Professional Goal Setting, how to become a successful professional in Aroostook County, actions that will help young people keep their job once they attain it, the importance of networking and ways to network, and how best to transition from college to career.

For more information on Aroostook Aspirations Initiative, visit our Web site at www.gauvinfund.org.

This information was submitted to us as part of a press release. If you would like to share your community news or event with our audience, please email newspi@townsquaremedia.com.

More From