 Okay, so welcome everyone and a good turnout. So thanks very much for coming. I'm Nells Pearson director of the Humanities Institute and Director of the School of Humanities and I'd like to welcome you to tonight's alumni panel on the humanities and careers and before we get going I just wanted to thank Richard Greenwald Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences for helping to fund this event and My associate directors of the Humanities Institute Dr. Patricia Berry in history who's over here Dr. Geraldine Johnson in modern languages and literatures who is here and thank them for their excellent support throughout the year and throughout the several years of their Role with the Institute and also of course thanks to our invaluable program coordinator miss Elizabeth Hastings Who's not here tonight But who has helped us to set this up as she helps with so many things And we're honored tonight to have with us four alumni who majored and minored in humanities disciplines at Fairfield And who will be sharing their career stories with us and in order of graduation years These are Jason Mancini Dr. Mancini who is a history major from 1994 and is now executive director of Connecticut Humanities of the Connecticut Humanities Council Then we have Courtney darts who graduated in 2001 with a double major in art history in English and she's now legal director of pro bono partnership in New York City And then we're also fortunate to have with us Matt pecoraro Third on the panel who graduated with major in philosophy and minor in classical studies in 2011 And he is the public policy associate at Harvard Medical Schools Judge Baker Children's Center and Then carolyn marino who graduated with an English major as well as Spanish and religious studies minors in 2011 and she is program coordinator of the prestigious committee on global thought at Columbia University And so you have quite a distinguished panel, you know last year's panel We had people who were in industry and in business and this time we showcase a different variety of careers that people with Humanities majors are able to get and before we wanted to before we go into this I just wanted to say a few words myself two years ago the humanities Institute created the an initiative called humanities at work and Not an issue of the is a series of events and resources that showcase the important role that humanities majors and minors play in Professional life and society at large and I would just encourage you if you get a chance to check out the website In fact, if you are in the seats and if you just Google the phrase humanities at work, it'll send you right to that We are the leading Institution with that project title and up here we have a statement from me about humanities and careers We have videos from previous panels of majors and minors in the humanities talking about the careers that they've earned You'll see the wide variety of Careers that they're working on we also have tons of resources if you want to read up on any of the information I'll briefly drop on you about the humanities and careers. It's all here lots of information in the media that We'll talk to you about how people are translating liberal arts into careers But the quick and the skinny of that material online is that you know While we don't spend a lot of time in the humanities courses and in liberal arts courses talking about jobs You know that doesn't mean that they don't they don't lead to them, but it's important to first recognize Why is it that we don't do that? I mean, why are we not really talking about specific career skills in classes? Well, I mean, you know, we're drawn to philosophy languages history literature and the arts because they challenge us to comprehend the historical ideological and spiritual depth of human experience to think and write creatively Theoretically and critically about the ideas that shape our world Right as Tyrus Miller who's the Dean of Humanities at UC Irvine says one of the values of engaging in philosophical and critical Thought is thinking deeply through the fame frameworks that confine our decisions and knowledge itself Which he actually says is one of the reasons the humanities will Shape the world in the future But the story we often forget to tell there for you know because we're so focused on those pursuing those ideas for their own sake in class and thinking through the implications of the ideas that have shaped human history That doesn't mean that at the end of that we haven't gained a tremendous amount of skills that translate into workforce And often we just don't tell the story of that right So the story we often forget to tell is that en route to those goals We acquire skills of analysis global cultural awareness critical inquiry and ingenuity as well as the inability as well as the ability to Articulate ideas to different audiences that give us distinct advantages in a variety of professions While also making us crucial contributors to social civic and democratic life So in recent years universities have increasingly focused on vocational education or using majors to train for specific jobs Which has meant that this diverse and adaptable skill set of humanities and liberal arts majors often gets overlooked Recently though this trend is changing and if you've paid attention to the news lately or you know the meet national media really starting to see that tide change the idea of the busting the myth that the humanities don't lead to careers and professions it's really been kind of a groundswell of a turning tide and Many of the people who are making these comments about the value of humanities and careers are not themselves in the humanities It's about people who are in economics people who are in business people who are in the sciences and they're really Chiming in to say you know we took the wrong turn here nationally when we started seeing the Education as only leading to a job as well as forgetting the liberal arts sort of career skills that get built in the process of doing that and so For example Steve Perlstein here for the economics columnists from the Washington Post Who points out that choosing a major based on intellectual curiosity doesn't detract from but in fact prepares you For today's dynamic career arcs not to mention their more traditional role in preparing us for an active and thoughtful Role in a democratic society as well as the ability to be leaders in that society After all this is the definition the classical definition of liberal arts ours liberalis is the you know Not that they are liberal, but that they're they're liberating right they offer us the ability to gain freedom from received ideas to see the bigger bigger picture so that's That's certainly been part of the argument There's also there's a lot of new books on this and we've mentioned this on the humanities at work site But I think it's worthwhile if you're at all interested to note some of these George Anders book you can do anything Which argues that vocational majors which usually trained for one particular type of job Which can fluctuate with market demands Whereas where he traces all kind of hundreds of liberal arts majors who have gone into a variety of careers and one of the things he reports back from Tracing all of these majors who have gone into a variety of careers is that they are particularly good at charting their own course Which is crucial in today's professional world their ability to adapt and to innovate on the job market to self invent to Tell their story rather than just putting out a CV And so all of the evidence that he collects is really showing not only just a diversity of what they can do But also this ability to adapt and to be able to shift multiple to multiple roles as a career arc evolves And that that's how a career arc often does of all We also had Christian Madsburg here a couple of years ago who wrote the book sense making the power of the humanities and the age of the algorithm and he is a He runs an international consulting firm that helps businesses think their way out of problems And it's based in Denmark and New York City and he hires only liberal arts graduates. He's always hired only liberal arts graduates and In fact, he has them read Heidegger and he has them think their way through problems by way of philosophy And it's a highly successful company But his point that why does he do so as he told us a couple of years ago is because the people who are coming from Philosophy literature history backgrounds in the arts are able to really think their way through things very creatively and innovative Innovatively they're not tied to prescriptive solutions and algorithms and he lot and you know one of the most successful consulting firms that you'll find It's a great book There's also been a lot of things in the news lately about the liberal arts in the tech sector Scott Hartley's book the fuzzy and the techie or Randall Strauss's book a practical education where he follows liberal arts graduates In Silicon Valley and he shows the tremendous impact that they're making and both of these writers point out that as everything becomes more Automated and formula-driven the people who are staying ahead of the invention curve are and the ones who are offering the most innovative ideas are often the humanists Right there also they also tend to be the communicators Scott Hartley says who manage this crucial interface between the technology and the and the human user right between the machine and its coding and Who's actually using it and why and so as the technology increases the need for that human person to stand the gap between those two is Increasing and the ability to stay ahead of the innovation curve. That's what Hartley talks a lot about He says that's that's really what's happening and you know what if you look at there's been a lot in the news about this Don't just take my word for it Forbes said in 2015 They wrote a great article on why the liberal arts degree has become text hottest ticket Business Insider did a story about Microsoft's big self-analysis study right so when Microsoft did this analysis of their whole company And who's actually succeeding and what types of skills are really leading to career success in that field They continually found that it's the liberal arts majors who are really making an impact and when they traced it They found more you know, they were actually surprised to find that Brad Smith the president was the one who called for and and then defended that study even more so Google did a similar thing that Google did a self-study that showed when they looked at their company and they looked at Who's actually rising the farthest right not maybe where are they coming in but where are they going and how are they rising? It was the people with the humanities majors or liberal arts heavy skills that were that were rising the farthest in the company You could you might enter higher at Google if you come in with tech But who was emerging as the leaders the visionaries the ones who were really challenging the innovation curve They found out that it was humanities and they didn't expect to find that when they did that study So you know again don't take my word for it Google it It's it was all over the web a couple of years ago So I think that's really important. You hear is it right the guy is reading Nietzsche. So, you know, I guess if you can Dissern the fact that history is not inherently Taliological then you're ready for just about any idea in a board meeting, right? You can think your way out of any any box if you can handle that point right Matt Matt will back me up on that Here's another thing that I another thing that I think will be interesting to you and look at the GMAT, right? What's the GMAT GMAT is the test that you take if you're going to enter graduate school in business, right? What does it test test quantitative reasoning verbal reasoning integrated reasoning and analytical writing? Now look at this from the 2010 profile of GMA admission test candidates breakdown of how majors scored philosophy scored in the highest History scored again. Well, well well up there art history scored very high English scored in the top half Languages scored in just about in the top half on the G look at the business majors on this test accounting business education marketing management, right? so That's why there are people who are going into careers out of humanities and succeeding right That's why Yahoo Finance did a study in 2015 where they based this on pay scale data That was released in the Wall Street Journal where they said if you look at median mid-career salaries again You think about entry-level salaries. That's one thing But what about the career arc? How are people being able to innovate beyond that entry-level position and then if you look at median mid-career salaries English and philosophy majors We're making more than people with degrees in business administration again. Look up. That's just look up the study It's the pay scale study and it was in Yahoo Finance in 2015 Let's look at the LSAT scores You notice a similar the similar thing to the GMATs, right? You would think that there are certain social sciences that might lead directly to law school and they certainly do have excellent programs in them here But it's just a little bit of a skewed view to say that if you want to go again That we think there's a specific major that leads to it look at the LSAT scores philosophy leads of the list again History English arts and humanities are all in the top half of the LSAT scores Whereas, you know political science criminal justice tracks that you might think go direct directly into it or lower And that's according to 2014 law school admissions, right? There was a whole thing going on politically a couple of years ago Where politicians really just started to run with this idea that you shouldn't go into the humanities and you shouldn't study You know history and literature and you know it was a politically hot idea to do it right because universities were also saying We need to sell you on on particular careers and you know job-related majors So Jeb Bush said famously right? It's important to have a liberal arts degree But realize you're gonna be working at a Chick-fil-A, right? So everybody got really so but what about the liberal art? You know, what about liberal arts majors among politicians? Jeb Bush majored in Latin American studies at UT Austin, which is a very liberal arts heavy program I mean UT Austin is one of the most liberal arts heavy PhD programs George W. Bush majored in history Mitt Romney in English Mario Cuomo in English Mike Huckabee, of course in religion So I mean, you know and again and this is on both sides of the aisle I mean I happen to list a few Republican politicians here But remember it was people on both sides of the aisle that were doing this Obama said don't major in our history So everybody was picking up that football But remember that a large number of them did study the liberal arts themselves So don't let them make you choose based on right because they're up. So anyway That's all I really have to say if you look at our humanities at work side I think you'll see a lot of those things there and you can look more deeply into some of the claims I've made here. It's all a lot of that's up there or you can Google for yourselves But with that said I just want to You could yeah I just want to turn things now over to our panel and maybe start things off with Jason Mancini Who's director of Connecticut humanities and history major back in the day? Back in the day is right But I was English way back in the day so and then we'll open things up for question after they're done with Well, that was a wonderful introduction to humanities I don't have prepared remarks, but what I will do is and I think the rest of the panel here will Sort of reflect on our experiences. I'll certainly reflect on mine And happy to answer questions at the end So I did I was here in the very early 90s. I graduated in 94 with a history degree I had also become quite interested in the nascent environmental studies program. I Went on to complete a master's degree and a PhD in anthropology at the University of Connecticut A lot of my interest in humanities is really grounded in my early life experience From the time I can really remember I Developed an interest in in archaeology and that passion In archaeology, especially indigenous archaeology Was fostered by an uncle of mine Who's a tribal archaeologist in the town I lived in I grew up in eastern Connecticut My uncle worked for the Mashantucka Pequot tribe if any of you have ever been the Foxwood's resort casino You'll be familiar with this tribal community. So my my My earliest memories are working on archaeological sites from the time I was seven or eight years old And really sort of developing this passion in Native American history And I continued this through high school And by the time I was ready for college My uncle strongly advised me not to study archaeology So that opened my pathway at Fairfield to try some new things and really to diversify my my interests and experience And and I will reflect, you know, some of the things that are most memorable from my time here Were the courses that made me think critically Really pushed me beyond my My the assumptions I had about the world I specifically remember a colonial Latin American history that challenged how histories are being written. Why are they being written? Who is the audience? and beginning to dismantle older colonialist ideas of how histories are Narrated and who else has a right to narrate those histories And that was very relevant to my own experience working with an Indian tribe and indigenous people in the New England region For any of you who have grown up here or pretty much anywhere in North America Indian people have been erased from our shared narratives and that's partly because They've never they've never authored in historically never authored significant resources So my interest became Really enmeshed and immersed in Opening up new pathways to to those narratives. I had also developed an interest in environmental studies and biology and Eventually ethnobotany. I was really interested in sciences No no offense to that anybody with an interest in science But I thought they were kind of boring without human experience and interaction So my interest became more and more cross-disciplinary And I pursued those interests while I was interested in ecology I wanted to know how people influence the environment change the world around them and how that in turn affected them So, you know these these are the the experiences I had Here at Fairfield and I was able to sort of take those those critical thinking skills And and Bring them to graduate school bring them back to the reservation that I worked on and build a career around that one of the things I don't want to go too far off the rails right now, but one of the things that I realized for those of you who spend a lot of time at the Sea Grape and And Keg parties on campus or off-campus. I don't know what the rules are they govern that I think by the time I Became a junior. I realized I kind of had enough of that and I really started migrating away from The regular parties and beginning to develop my own ideas and an interest and really pushing them Finding my interests developing them And that took me sometimes away from campus. I remember doing an internship at Yale's Peabody Museum Where I had a chance to get into the collections and do some curatorial work Through an internship program at the time And those are important moments for me that opened my eyes to other cultures Getting me out of my comfort zone with Native American history and culture and into other world cultures So I also want to mention, too I made a note here Really about Checking checking my privilege. This is a pretty wealthy place And and coming from an Indian reservation and actually there's two res Indian reservations in eastern Connecticut that I worked on these are some of the Before the casinos there were some of the poorest places In North America and in many cases still are So becoming really aware of the people I was working with in their experiences and developing empathy around that While I worked with them Really enabled me to build a deeper relationship Among the communities that I would eventually build a career with so I Can certainly talk more about that, but I'd like to just mention as as I graduated new opportunities opened up As as the Pequot community became remarkably successful with Foxwood's casino They turn their attention to building other endeavors and one of them was the Mashantucket Pequot Museum So just as I graduated that doorway opened and I began to do not just the archaeological work, but The museum needed researchers. They need collections Managers they needed curators and I really kind of was open to trying all of this new Work in the museum world. I had no professional experience in the museum world, but Other people were coming in from that world and I was Asking questions. I was exploring New ideas new New career paths through that So I held different positions at the Pequot Museum as it was being developed You know both in terms of research in terms of collections management curation One of my positions came back to archaeology, but then I developed more administrative roles by getting involved in Deeper level of archival research and exhibit development And through that I continued I began to expand my my graduate career and once I completed my master's degree I was able to start thinking about teaching and I really enjoyed the Identifying stories that nobody had really thought about or heard or told and bringing that to bear for a public that was largely uninformed And because I was able to to develop these new stories and frame them within both history and anthropology I Had decided I wanted to Teach and so I hadn't there was an opportunity at the University of Connecticut beginning to do some adjunct Teaching and I did that Learned some new fields just by trying it But then really developed my expertise Is across disciplinary field of ethno history which is sort of at the intersection of history and anthropology? in my my work Began to translate into new areas of research most people think about Indian people American Indians on the land living on reservations What my research revealed because I was asking these critical hard questions about a population of people When they're not on the reservations, where are they? And by asking that and looking at archival records and really probing that deeply and and with a Regional framework. I realized that many indigenous people We're actually getting on maritime vessels And traveling the waters of the world Most people don't think of Indian people beyond the land But I was finding them all over the world because of their transit on Whaleships and commercial vessels And through that I was able to develop not just an understanding of that but a deeper understanding of the social networks They were forming I think we're all familiar with Facebook and Instagram These are ways really interesting ways and modern ways of communicating amongst one another but translating that social network narrative to How people interact on a human level with one another across social boundaries social worlds economic environments and so on Really Began to inform my work in a new way and I was able to sort of develop a reputation around that through my academic work And and build on that and every time I wrote a paper, you know Here's a little trick of the trade if you're going on to graduate school Every time you have to write a paper think of it as a chapter in your master's thesis or your doctoral dissertation Makes your pathway a lot easier So so I did that and and along the way both both through These teaching experiences and being open to new opportunities, but the the work and the relationships I was building at the museum expanded to a global framework The the indigenous communities I was working with in southern New England all of a sudden I Learned they had relatives in New Zealand. They had relatives in Hawaii. They had relatives in Alaska So I began tracking these relationships down and traveling around the world in pursuit of these new histories nobody's ever heard and Developing new exhibits and publishing works on it So and participating in humanities conferences at mystic seaport Where Nells and I met So these are the kinds of things that were were really inspiring to me But I was still hungry. I was developing an interest in administrative work. I wanted I had an opportunity to move from Leading the research department at the museum to directing the Pequot Museum, which I did for three years four years Which was an entirely different challenge But was really rooted in the same kinds of things relationship building connecting people to stories making it relevant To their lives Understanding diverse communities with an inclusive framework So that that interest in engaging a broader community beyond tribal communities became really important and then My my interest continued an opportunity emerged a Connecticut humanities where Connecticut humanities is is partly a granting organization that funds other organizations to tell great stories or Panel discussions to tell great stories both the creation Implementation dissemination of those stories Would also really intrigued me and inspired me and I would encourage all of you to look at it or our digital humanities Which is an entirely I wouldn't say new now, but it's continuing to emerge the digital humanities realm is really interesting From when I first encountered this by mapping these voyages of indigenous mariners around the world and tracking their global travels To the work we do with Connecticut history org Which is sort of an encyclopedia of Connecticut history? Working with the state historian today for a website called a website and NPR Pieces every day Today in Connecticut history is is a daily dose of something relevant to us in this state We're working on a Collaboration with the office of tourism for the state On an app called contours with conn tours and that's bringing to bear The the relevant histories of Connecticut and placemaking For Connecticut, but but bringing these stories to life again that have been long-buried And hidden from from our understanding in view There's a lot there's lots out there, and we're hoping to lead the way Not just in Connecticut, but nationally So that's probably consume my eight minutes But it's probably good framework, and I can turn it over So just by way of reintroduction my name is Courtney darts I graduated in 2001 with a double major in English and Art History And today I am a lawyer working at a nonprofit that serves other nonprofits in Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey And the path of how I got from there to here in five minutes so Before I even start that I just want to say how inspiring it is to see so many people in the room here and Coming on giving up your evening to hear us talk about our careers And you're all starting out and figuring out what you want to do, and it's just such a great time And I'm super excited for all of you, and I'm grateful to have the opportunity to talk a little bit about my experience So I came to English and Art History as a major as majors Just because that's what I liked the most and one of the things I really loved about my fearfully experience Was that the curriculum encouraged you to try a lot of different areas? And so I took classes in philosophy and history and I took Language classes and I took math and science and but English and Art History is what stuck And partly that had to do with the subject matter and partly it had to do with the wonderful faculty in those programs Some of whom are here this evening And I this made the naive of me But I always just trusted that I would find a job when I graduated I didn't know what I wanted to do and I think this is the exciting thing about being a humanities student and also the Scary thing about being a humanities student is the possibilities seem infinite and so As we were preparing for this talk Professor Bowen reminded me that I went through a period of discernment when I graduated Which is a polite way of saying that I was trying a lot of different things and trying to figure out What would would suit me in my career and I do that as an undergraduate too. I had internships I always worked throughout college For financial need, but also because I enjoyed it. It was a good resume builder But I really didn't know when I graduated exactly what I wanted to do and I was thinking about graduate school I thought maybe I would like to teach so that Led me a year after I graduated to actually come back to Fairfield and work in the visual and performing arts department As the department coordinator and I did that because I wanted to see what it was like on the inside To be a university professor and to get a real sense of what it would be like to go to graduate school And the job market and try to make as informed a decision as possible Before I made the decision about committing several years of my life to further education And that was a great experience for many reasons Not the least of which is that the faculty continued to mentor me even as their employee no longer their student and gave me opportunities to do grant writing and so in that I sort of found An opportunity to use the research and the writing skills that I had developed through my humanities courses but in a very practical application and sort of sparked or fueled My own sense of social justice and so that led to the decision to go to law school And I would not have thought when I graduated in 2001 that I would be going to law school in 2005 But that's what I did. I went to Fordham. So another good Jesuit school And I went with the intention of doing public interest law And so there's a pretty clear connection I mean, it's been mentioned a couple of times this evening already that for those of us who go to law school There the humanities are well represented in the ranks of law school Attendees although there are plenty of people who did economics and business degrees Some Michael's friends have been anthropology majors philosophy majors history majors language majors And here we all were in the same place taking the same classes preparing to be lawyers. I Worked for a firm for a year when I graduated which was also good experience But my heart lay with doing public interest work And so I moved in 2009 to the nonprofit where I still work today Called pro bono partnership. We recruit and support volunteer lawyers from large law firms and in-house legal departments to Provide pro bono legal services to nonprofits serving underserved communities or providing other important services As I said in Connecticut, New York and New Jersey And I was a staff attorney there for six years and then I became the first director of education there And now I'm the first legal director there And so I've moved out of the day-to-day of working with clients and I'm now in more of a managerial role and so you know briefly I Like I said at the beginning I chose my majors just because that's what I loved studying I mean it's such a gift to spend four years of your life studying Something that's interesting and motivates you every day if you can make a career out of doing the same thing that's an even greater gift and so The things that I loved about my undergraduate courses the research the writing the critical thinking skills that were developed All Translate beautifully to the work I do day to day I mean everything obviously as a lawyer, but also as a manager is about research and writing and making your case I do a fair amount of fundraising now clearly. That's also about communications You know, I think that studying English and art history you it's the study of people right? You're you're at least it was for me you're reading novels You're thinking about the arc of human history as expressed through the visual arts It really honed. I think my Approach to the world a sense of empathy An ability maybe to put myself in other people's shoes that came from reading all those novels and and I really think it makes me a better manager and as Dr. Pearson mentioned I do think that it has made me a good critical thinker and a very adaptive Personality as well. I'm always looking to continue to learn and I do see that in my friends who were humanities majors not to say that that's not true of other people as well, but We sort of go into life always curious and you're always trying to learn more about yourself and about the world and And that's a wonderful thing to carry through your whole career and so even though a fair amount of my day now involves things like databases and Coding the website and you know these skills that are less directly connected to what I studied I'm interested in them now for the same reason. I was interested in English and art history That's what I think is interesting and I always want to continue learning and I think that You You're always going to be learning in your career You know jobs exist today that no one could have imagined when I graduated in 2001 and so I do think that You know coming to college I can so I can certainly understand it where college is a huge commitment of money and time and I can certainly understand why students may feel pressure or Concerned that they have to sort of major in the right thing to make themselves marketable in the job search I do get that but I think that You know the whole point of this panel and why we're here tonight Is to say that that you you can come out on the other side with a job that there's no one path to professional success And that you you know if you can be true to yourself and what interests you and maintain your curiosity Those are the things that will really serve you very well in whatever job you do Very glad to be with you all today It's a little bit warmer down here than it is in Boston just a little bit But this is the time of year where any degree warmer is good It's a really interesting experience to kind of reflect on life and try to identify the threads that tie all the years together and Where our choice of major? Fits into the whole thing and then in eight minutes or less Tell you something that is hopefully helpful on your own journey I must remind you I was a philosophy major and so brevity is not my natural tendency Something for the duty can't can't attest to But I will do my best First let me tell you a little bit about my life since Fairfields to give some context for how studying philosophy Has impacted my course After graduating here. I moved to Washington DC Where I spent three years working in and then managing a large home for adults with intellectual disabilities? I then moved to Boston to attend graduate school at Boston College also a fine Jesuit University Where I earned my masters of social work degree with a particular focus on program design and systems development In my professional life now, I manage the evidence-based policy Institute at Judge Baker Children's Center Which is a Boston based Harvard affiliate that specializes in child and family mental health? At the Institute we work with state and national partners to address pervasive issues through legislative advancements and systems reform Utilizing all scientifically proven practices and approaches much of my work is with the Massachusetts State Legislature State and community agencies advocacy organizations and service providers to ensure that the services and supports we're making available to youth and families Are maximally effective? We also have a fellowship program where we train graduate and undergraduate interns who are interested in Public policy and children's mental health. There are summer internship opportunities So if any of you live near Boston and are interested feel free to talk to me after And then as of September I will also be on the adjunct faculty at Boston College School of Social Work In my personal life, I am having musician a lover of the outdoors and a coffee enthusiast something I think I discovered during finals while at Fairfield But above all things I consider myself someone who's very committed to the pursuit of truth with the capital team In my own life and in the world around me I've always been fascinated with relationships both into personal relationships and the importance of those on our individual well-being But also cultural and societal relationships and how it changes in one corner of society Can have sometimes profound impacts in another corner and then to understand where things overlap and where gaps exist I began to realize that everything in life comes down to these links these sometimes opaque connections in our everyday lives And when I discovered philosophy in professor Celia's class I Discovered a reflection of the person that I was the person I had always been and the person I still am today I chose philosophy simply put because it felt like the right thing to do and it made me happy And every decision I've made since then has been in pursuit of discovering and then actualizing the person I'm truly meant to be In all of its complexities and its imperfections and strengths and vulnerabilities To look beyond what others might say I'm supposed to do and instead discover what it is I meant to do And it was it was clear to me that Philosophy as a major was the necessary choice that led in that direction I had no idea what that meant and in some ways. I'm still figuring it out, but I knew that's what I needed to do The first and maybe only message I'd like to convey to you is this That the decisions you make should always be in alignment with the person that you are and in the pursuit of the person That you're meant to be It seems to me that the world has more than its fair share of folks who are doing exactly what they've been told They're supposed to do and all too often the person they're told they should be is very different from the person They really are And there's something in this world that when you discover it, it'll fit like a glove and a student said University You have unparalleled access to all the exploration and all the discovery that your minds and hearts could want My decision study philosophy was the most surprising and best discovery I could have made Because in addition to learning how to endure a relentless mocking from my friends I Also learned the value of pursuing what's important to me It taught me how to think critically analyze problems From every angle and to identify and pursue solutions It taught me how to comprehend complexity and break it down to its simplest parts It taught me how to look beyond the obvious the value in understanding another person's perspective especially in a heated debate And to see the connection between all things It taught me that the best questions in life are the ones with the least obvious answers because those are the ones that teach you to think for yourself And it taught me to be comfortable with the unknown and with the unanswerable Because life especially life after college requires comfort with the unknown and with the unanswerable And it taught me that I have a place in this world that the person I am the way I think about things and the way I approach problems Has a place and can have a meaningful impact on the world around me You each have a place in this world You are meant to find it. You are designed to experience joy and to find your way through significant hardship Emerging from the other side better prepared and with greater capacity You are meant for community and you were meant for friendship and you were meant for love But most of all you're meant to belong No path is free of challenge and trade-offs and you will face your share of both no matter what direction you choose But there is a place where you belong And it's okay not to know what that means right now Just stay open to discovery and let it evolve as you do and as your life circumstances change As your understanding of yourself grows But whatever you decide to do make sure you really do it. No half-assed attempts Anything worth doing is worth excelling in And when I told my parents I wanted to study philosophy. They said great. That's exactly what you should do But if you're going to do it do it well let no one ever accuse my parents of not knowing their son So I worked really hard and when I graduated I was awarded 11 Tino award for excellence in study philosophy I was also an active member in the campus ministry community as a founding member and director of the Lord's Chords I sang in the glee club by sang in the chamber singers and was an alumni mentor in the Ignatian residential college Which at the time was in Loyola Hall, and I was actually father duty's alumni mentor and Outside of school. I had very active and healthy life My life was and still is driven by the things that I'm passionate about and I sought to excel in them So I ask you where does your passion lead you and how can you pursue it in a way that will lead to growth? To contribution to the greater social good and to a sense of fulfillment and belonging To reflect some to reflect some of the wisdom imparted upon me by my Jesuit education When you're faced with deciding the direction of your own life, what would the best version of yourself do? What brings you joy? What are you good at and what does the world need? And let me tell you the world needs a lot the world needs economists and innovators and musicians and graphic designers The world needs social workers and lawyers and teachers The world needs role models The world needs people to seek out their own sense of belonging and to be the person that they were meant to be Not the person. I think someone else thinks they should be There's a great quote often attributed to Oscar Wilde be yourself Everyone else has already taken and I think there's I think there's wisdom in that So I urge you to find your place of belonging and pursue a life that's in line with who you are become the person you were meant to be and Do something that needs doing? so I Think I probably was close to eight Hi everyone, I'm Carolyn Marino I'm gonna go through my experience from Fairfield to where I'm at now and hopefully you guys can pick up some of the lessons I've learned along the way So when I arrived at Fairfield as a freshman I was an English major with a news writing journalism concentration. I had the idea that I was going to be a Magazine editor. I wanted to be a features writer and magazines like what I want to do So first thing I think is humanities people is about being flexible this job You think you might be doing might not really exist so much the industry might change in like 10 15 years time, right? so while at Fairfield taking classes in the core and thanks to Much appreciated encouragement and support from specific faculty members here in this room I declared minors in Spanish minors in religious studies and I changed my concentration from news writing to creative writing And so I also was involved in WVOF the radio station. I had a radio show all four years while I was here Really interested in music and in multimedia technologies. So it's something that is very cool I think it's been touched on in the panel that as humanities majors you are able to Kind of dip your toes into different interests in ways that friends who are nursing majors or at the engineering school Don't have that flexibility or have more narrow track and so Coming off of that and something I really recommend for you guys as humanities majors is Being able to study abroad. You have such flexibility I mean even business majors have some restrictions about where they can go for study abroad But as humanities majors like the world is open to you and Fairfield really encourages this So my junior year I did a semester abroad at the University of Edinburgh in Scotland I was the only student from Fairfield that semester who went there I'd never been on an airplane before I went there much less out of the country So I kind of got there and it was like wow everyone I've ever known ever in my life Is a five six-hour plane ride away. It was a bit of a moment So I learned a lot in that semester and living in a new place in a new country and it it taught me that You know, we're kind of ingrained that at least you know being in school that in order to be learning something I've got to be sitting at a desk and there has to be a professor there talking to me knowledge But that experience of studying abroad actually Open eyes to being able to learn things outside the classroom And it's really important because it's something that for most of your life You actually will be outside a classroom and being able to learn through experience and so kind of In addition to that talking about out of the classroom experiences my senior year at Fairfield I had an internship and again still English major so internship with WWE and Yes, when people look at me they're like wrestling really so yes I interned with WWE and I Was not hired because I was like well-versed in Rey Mysterio and Seamus I was I don't know everyone's like I I could write well. I could communicate well and Those were the skills that I was hired for And it's something that I think we're very good at as humanities majors is being able to learn Foreign content pretty quickly. So, you know, I for example in my religious studies minor I took a course on The Dead Sea Scrolls with dr. Harkins I started that class being like what is Talmud and then by the end I could know some things about Second Temple Judaism So like like that my internship I arrived literally my first week googling like what is a pile driver? And by the end I'm not kidding But by the end I was writing the tweets only they were called like updates for the mobile app But you know writing tweets about wrestling So I think that's something that is so key is being able to learn specific content very quickly And I think it's something that people in humanities are very good at doing So then after I graduated Fairfield upon recommendation by dr. Johnson in the modern languages department I applied to work for the Ministry of Education in Spain to teach English So I was living in Madrid for the year after I graduated teaching English with students at two different public schools And then after I finished that contract. I moved back to the US to New York and I was applying for jobs And someone I knew from my internship at WWE He was working at a different company, but he got in touch with me and he's like, oh, I know you're they're looking for work I the company I work at we don't have any openings right now But we're moving offices where you've got a new brand new fancy office and you know computers So can you come and set up the cat like help set up the computers in this new office? So I'm like, okay, you know, I need I need work So it was like Friday Saturday Sunday I was working, you know with the IT team to set up all their computers in the new office On Monday the company called me up and they said hey, you worked really well with us over the past weekend setting up the computers would you come and Work in our quality assurance department. We have this opening and before we're gonna post out there, you know, you did really well So it's something that I know everyone in their career panel things you talk about your LinkedIn and your personal brand but also like working hard like in terms of just Trying to do as much as you can in your job People will remember that and they'll reach out and they'll want to help you And so the the position I had was a temporary position And while I was there as applying for other other jobs And ended up getting a job with the Institute of International Education IIE and it was really helpful because my supervisor at the pharmaceutical company Wrote me a really great recommendation and helped me get to that next position at IIE Institute of International Education And I worked there for a few years Working on an international educational exchange program So my role was supporting foreign Fulbright scholars who came to the US to do research And then I also worked on a program with the Brazilian government, which was Brazil scientific mobility program Which was an exchange program for Brazilian students to come to the US and so that was a really great experience and but after about two and a half years the program funding changed and So we knew that within six months our jobs weren't going to exist And again flexibility in being humanities. So I thought that this would be a good opportunity to Go back to school get a master's degree most of the people I was working with had master's degrees And I thought it might catch up to me if I didn't have one after a while. So I Got a master's in international relations from the University of Edinburgh in Scotland again And then after I finished that degree moved back to New York And was hired by Columbia University to be the program coordinator for the committee on global thought Which is where I work now and my job is Doing events logistics communications for the committee supporting we have a master's in global thought program and I support the the faculty in their research projects So yeah until my final kind of point and something I actually asked my boss about because I said I was gonna come and speak with you Guys tonight and kind of what wisdom and he said that sometimes you need to Turn right in order to go straight and I think you know the meaning is that Things you might not expect can get to you somewhere. So if you were to ask me, you know Even when I was at Fairfield, how can I get to work for like II or Columbia? You know, I mean and really I have had great experiences like being able to work for a bit Brazil and with those universities I would never think oh, well that weekend you spent moving computers is going to come in handy You know like that internship that you had when we were at Fairfield or even that class that you took You know, it's it's something that you can't foresee But that it it does work out and yeah, good luck. It'll be great I think it's important that things that they've all raised Yes Sure, yeah, so Larsh For those of you don't know it's an international nonprofit that as I alluded to focuses on creating homes With adults with intellectual disabilities and the word with is particularly important there Because whereas typical group homes the individuals with disabilities and the individuals without disabilities the support staff live separately in large community There's this real emphasis on genuine home and genuine community building and so everyone lives together in the same home It is it's originally a Catholic organization Then and then has expanded since it's now interdenominational across the world and Yeah, like I said, the the focus is on You know building genuine community genuine relationships and the important impact that that has not just on service care and provision in the day-to-day Caregiving setting but also kind of in the bigger spiritual emotional, you know human sense of the word so In addition to doing, you know daily things and helping support individuals with the daily life tasks everything from getting out of bed in The morning getting them off to their day programs also managing their finances managing medical Medical appointments and the various things related to that. There's also shared community, you know dinners. You have dinners together every night There's you know shared prayer after dinner And this real emphasis on going through life together. So Also realizing it's been a long time since I've had to describe to someone what Larsh is I'll start since I'm the art history representative on the panel I mean it's a jewel of the program It's a jewel of a program here at the University and I found that when I went into interviews It was not I mean it depends on the job you're going for but You could talk very intelligently. I think about your Research projects the writing you had done If you did the study abroad program, which many of the art history students here do I think I think every interview regardless of where you're coming from is about Selling yourself to an employer in some way and so thinking critically before you walk in about what are the needs of the job And then how can you take what's in your background and shape it to what they're looking for? So it's it's interviewing skills, but it's also the cover letter I Spend a lot of time hiring people now cover letters are actually I think they're still very important I realized that in large companies, you know people are uploading hundreds and hundreds of resumes and Schools of thought on this differ, but for me Always in the interviewing and the hiring process It's what is the case that this person can make for me about how what they've done in the past connects to what I'm looking for In this job and so you do have to put some time into it It is a time-intensive way of looking for a job, which is not easy. I know But the people who can make that case is it almost doesn't matter where they're starting from the point is how Did they align it to where I want them to go? and then Side note which I did not Do very naturally when I was a student, but have since learned is essentially it's just like working your network And I know that's you know your network is small when you're a student but it does grow and probably Carolyn and Matt being Younger can talk more intelligently about how you market yourself in the digital realm because I've worked at the same place for ten years but I think that Jobs come up through all different ways and so Casting your nets far and wide letting people know sort of the kinds of things you're interested in finding out what the professional Associations are for those kinds of jobs making connections people cold call me all the time and say how do I get the job? You have and I'm always happy to pay it forward and talk about well This is what I did and and you can do that too people will be surprisingly generous with their time So I think you know just just work every avenue that you have to you And then when you get in the door focus on how how what you have done in the past connects directly with what this person is looking for I would also add to that and say you know things take a long time and you know forever is a really long time And so wherever you start You know you will have mobility you will have opportunity to grow and to develop and to expand upon that I think it also is really important to start from a sense of You need to know what you do well. You also need to know where where your limitations are and Maybe have some vague idea about how you'd like to to build on that and to develop But you know I mean everything we've said today comes from you know between 10 and 25 years of doing it every day after college and so You know I guarantee you that when we were in the chairs that you were in We didn't have language for it and we didn't know what to say or even what we were trying to say So you know also be gentle with yourself as you're trying to figure it out hold yourself to a high standard But give yourself the time And let yourself work into the the job and into the career and into the life that that you want. I Could maybe just add briefly. I Actually had my first interview a year and a half ago I Never had to interview for a job before but I will say that what one of the things that translates really effectively For me anyway, and what I've heard from each of the panelists here is is your passion humanities people's like Humanities folks like like these folks. I'm sure many of you find your passion because that will translate far and wide And that's a thing that when I when I give lectures or give talks about the things that I love to do It it is it has a huge impact And if you can you can find what that nugget is in your life and translate that to the world and make that connection It's magic Yeah, and I'll just chime in with one thing and then we'll go over to Dr. Orlando, but I Well, I can't find it now But if the book by George Anders and the book by Christian Mads beer on the humanities and careers I mean, I would read those they have a lot of really good Anecdotal stories about people who are trying to do exactly what you're trying to do And so thinking about how other people navigated that can give you some ideas for how to do it So the book by Anders and Mads beer, but so I didn't I didn't have the experience of parents saying Don't do this What I did have is you're you love archaeology expect to be poor for the rest of your life And if you can deal with that You know that that's one path But what I what I for me knowing that you know are there's not a lot of money in the field of archaeology You can be a shovel bum for the rest of your life But if you can take that passion and translate it upward and outward, you know becoming the best at what you do And and developing that passion becoming you know for me it was becoming a curator at a museum It was becoming a senior staff member in a research department. It was getting a master's degree in teaching You know if you can if you can elevate yourself in those ways, you know It goes from you know the level of finding an artifact and being excited about an artifact to being able to tell You know an incredible story and its relevance to humanity In the human experience on an entirely different level Being able to to migrate from that one fine to how do we narrate human history? Is an entirely different space And bringing it to a different audience like that. I think really Matt it mattered for me Yeah, I've just add to that and this is the lawyer in me But you do your research and you make your case And you be your own advocate because I think that is a very common attitude in fact I did not have that attitude of my parents, but I watched one of my roommates go through it her dad was a corporate executive and He said I was majoring in unemployment and so was she and now he was a history major So I don't know what that was about but but I think I think there's the reference the resources You've been given tonight you sort of think about where you want your career to go And I think you you you build your case that your parents can feel comfortable with your decision And I absolutely recognize those are very very hard conversations to have And finally I had them when I wanted to go to law school My parents were supportive of me being an English in our history major But they thought law school sounded really hard and expensive and so I Mean they were supportive, but they were kind of like really so You know, I think I think there's a lot of information out there And and you can you can make a compelling I think Argument as to where you see your career going and and hopefully a lay there feels which are clearly coming from a loving place But that that's a hurdle a lot of people have to get over no doubt. Yeah, and I'll just one last thing about that is is You know life is has no shortage of hard situations It's gonna throw at you and so if this is one of the ones that you have to find your way through It's just it's one of many the good news is you are all perfectly capable of finding your way through whatever the hard situation like those at you But but I would just I would echo You know think through I get I also was lucky that my folks my father was also a corporate executive and was super Okay with his son studying philosophy but But you know the one answer that I don't have is is how do you effectively communicate the message because it's what I feel Like I'm supposed to do to a parent And so in the end of the day, I think you seem to decide what course of action is the one that you need to go down and and Figure out how to get down it And it'll pass that difficult time like every difficult time will pass Oh, and I just wanted to add to that too, and I should have said this earlier obviously alumni are a great resource for you and They were resources for me when I was here and I'm always happy to speak to Fairfield students I think a lot of alumni you find are very generous with their time and the art history program in particular Was a standout in this area when I was here because of the database that dr. Schwab mentioned They do an alumni forum every three years with people calm a lot of people got jobs at it My sister was also an art history major at Fairfield She did an internship at Christie's that came through an art history alumni who was working there She moved into events planning that was her career and that was directly related to this internship that she got through an alum that she connected with through her majors, so Definitely work your alumni connections as well Michelle, I don't know if you want to chime into that I mean we have a fairfield art history grad and Michelle de Marseau who's translated that into a PhD and then into museum administration as and a faculty position, so I mean both her bridesmaids And I think it's also, you know It's important to think as long term as you can you know, and they tell you and learn to drive I forget but they'd say look like two miles out or whatever it is So look into the near future, you know very seldom are you totally at the whim of whatever winds you're blowing So you can strategically place yourself in a direction in a position to lead to career growth and to lead to change kind of No matter where you begin And I think that's an important perspective to take when you're trying to figure out where to go And the other thing which is a little bit adjacent but important to is is never undervalued the Wonder that is networking. I Similarly have had very few job interviews in my life Because most most of what I've done has been discovered through networking the job I have now I was and I was a graduate student at BC and I went to a conference in Tampa, Florida And my now boss was presenting on some of the work that's getting done at Judge Baker. I thought it was absolutely fascinating And so I went up to him and talked to him after And we exchanged contact information and we got back we got to get a coffee when we were back in Boston Two or three conversations later. I figured out that I was actually being interviewed and about a week after that They offered me a job and here I am So networking I just I'll chime in real quick of the question. I When I was putting together the panel I really liked the way that each one of you pursued graduate degrees But at all kinds of different stages and none of them were things that seemed to me that you were going into Right away. I mean maybe Jason years was the most sort of direct line but I Know a lot of you who are seniors who are finishing your you know undergraduate degrees are thinking about should I go to graduate school? And I get this question all the time like should I take the GREs right now? And should I get shouldn't I go directly into graduate school and just pause for a second and look at how all these people said they Didn't go right in they started in careers. They had there. What was your Carolyn? What was your position your period call or no It was court your period of discernment for Courtney, but you know in fact we're at faculty members We're often saying yeah, right. Yeah, we're often saying no You don't have to finish a PhD in six years after getting your undergrad It often goes about it in different ways. Do any of you want to talk about that where you know? How did you realize the graduate degree was the right one? Did you know what couldn't have been the right one when you originally graduated? I mean I actually did apply to Graduate programs my senior year Fairfield because it is a bit of a thing I think where you know it feels very much where you've always been in school And now it's like what am I going to do and well how can more school be wrong, right? Which you know, but I think it's important that you see that You know there might not necessarily be a rush to do that right then and there and then it can be very valuable to Get some different experiences to get a better sense of actually which graduate degree is right for you Right for like your long-term like professional goals As opposed to kind of jumping into something maybe because you kind of don't know what else to do or because you're scared of of you know Being in this kind of place of discernment. I I found it much More valuable also in my when I did go to graduate school having had the professional experience It was such a weird experience because actually in my program There are only a few of us who had worked for you know some time before doing the program There were many people who were like right out of undergrad and it was just a very different experience. I think for us You know, it was very beneficial because we could see how the work that we're doing in the classroom could relate to professional kind of a longer trajectory and I again, I mean you always Think about who's giving you the advice So I find like usually people who tell you go right to grad school or people who did that and then people, you know But I really encourage you to not rush into anything and to have some experiences professional experiences You know And I would say again forever is a really long time the rest of your life is a really long time So so give yourself that time and space to discover where you're headed and what makes the most sense I actually thought I was gonna go to law school and and I maybe I still I don't know But when I was working in large I was working with a bunch of MSW's and I had never really given much thought or knew much About social work, but then I was I was you know working with folks and they were talking about you know Macro social work macro social work and so what is that? and It's what I just described to you while working at the policy and systems level to enact change and I Was particularly interested with the science-based approaches, so You know that found me And the other thing I would say is is by giving yourself space and time you also give yourself space to change course You can kind of always change course, but like graduate school is really expensive. So think about it But but you know changing course is a perfectly viable option And and again, that's where if you position yourself you can you can always kind of think three steps ahead You can always kind of see the direction you're headed in and is it where you go and ask yourself Where do I want to be a year from now? Is this it is what where does this lead to where will I be a year from now? If I stay here Thinking in 12-month intervals, you know, there's a good way to start I just wanted to comment on a personal level. I changed a lot in my early 20s you're still growing in many ways and finding out who you are as a person and I think you've forgotten excellent advice on this point But I'm just gonna echo Matt's point that student loan debt is very very real and so I think that for me It was a given that I would work regardless before making that commitment But it also gave me the space to make sure that feel more confident in the decision I was making to apply for the financial aid that made it feasible for me to go into the area of law that I wanted to Do that was a whole year's process So taking your time. I don't think I don't think that it hurts You to take some time in your early 20s in any way Some people will know this is what they want to do and they will go straight through But I think if you're if you're going to it to try to figure out what it is you want to do That's probably not the right use of graduate school And you'd be better served to work for a little while before you commit not to mention working for a while Makes you more appealing to graduate schools In a in a significant way, especially in today's world where master's degrees Are becoming more and more the norm kind of to your point from before the more you can demonstrate experience and and and and a skill set and a desire to continue to build that skill set the more appealing you will be To the universities that you apply to and also the more appealing you will be the financial aid offices of those universities That are the ones handing out scholarships so Anyone else other? Yeah, I was yeah, definitely You mean for them to just talk independently, but yeah, yeah, no, I think that's a great idea In fact, let's just take the rest of the time to just meet our panelists come up and talk to them You know and they'd be happy to