 Industrial Roundtable, or IR for short, is the largest student-run career fair in the nation. We at the Purdue Engineering Student Council put it on for 450 companies who are in search of students looking for internships, co-ops, and full time opportunities. The fair is open to all STEM majors, though it is engineering targeted, and freshmen through grad students are more than welcome to attend. It's very very well put out and thought through and on top of that it is all student run. A lot of career fairs aren't student run. Our mission in the Purdue Engineering Student Council is serving students, serving industry, and serving the community, and to me IR is really it hits all three of those pillars. So with serving students obviously Industrial Roundtable is the largest career fair that we put on at Purdue. It's something that we're really proud of and again it's something that's very tangible to see the work that we're doing. We all showed up on Memorial Mall I think is around 4 a.m. more like lugging cinder blocks of tables, setting up tents, and it's you know it's dark outside so we can't see anything and I kind of had like a greater appreciation for what goes on with Industrial Roundtable. The energy is really really amazing. When we work on it as a committee it's you're with your friends and we're running a career fair together. It is definitely amazing to be part of that tradition especially since it goes back so far. The history is remarkable of Industrial Roundtable from where it's grown used to be surrounded by the engineering fountain to moving over to Memorial Mall. It's not only grown in size but it's grown in impact. Now we're helping over 10,000 students each year hundreds of companies. It was always a well-received event very motivating for the Purdue community to be able to have that opportunity of employers coming to campus seeking Purdue engineering and science students and having that continue throughout over 40 years is a remarkable achievement. It's incredible to think about the history. Kind of what I think of with Industrial Roundtable is it's that foot in the door for Purdue engineering students and it's really cool because it almost always has been where you can go and talk to a recruiter at IR and they found their job on the other side of that table and so that's something that's very special that we see a lot is that there's recruiters that were students five, 10, 15, 20 years ago that found their job through this event. Just getting exposure to that professional world that you're going to be entering in a few years. It's something you can't learn in a classroom and it's something that IR really exposes you so it's just an incredible experience and everybody looking for internships, co-ops, full-time, all ages. If you're a Purdue engineering student you're qualified to get a job and the culture is just so great. Everybody's willing to help each other out and pump each other up to you know go secure their dream job. They're talking with the best students I think when it comes when it comes to Purdue engineering and are just depth of all the majors that we have especially in all the experiences that we have from freshmen to senior to grad students like this is a hotspot for recruitment at any of the top engineering companies or any companies as a whole. It's 2,000 company representatives and 12,000 students and we can bring them all together at the same place and help companies meet their needs but also help students showcase like what has made them great. The incredible things about Purdue I feel like we have clubs that you can't get involved in anywhere else and that's something that company recruiters definitely highlight to me and is a big selling point for our fair. So a lot of the recruiters that we see coming back to industrial round table are Purdue alumni. I think that just speaks to not only the culture of Purdue but also the magic of industrial round table because Purdue alumni do want to come back and they want to recruit Purdue students because they know like the caliber and the quality of the interns in the full-time hires that they would be getting from industrial round table. Some people go there just to learn and experience the career other people can go there really looking for an internship in that job so whatever your intent is for industrial round table it could definitely fit your needs and what your goal is for that in terms of really kick-starting your professional career.