Dartmouth Career Services will see the possible benefits and drawbacks of its new online system, DartBoard, this weekend as students prepare for the first resum drop of Fall term corporate recruitment. The new system, developed this year, has replaced MonsterTRAK, the global recruiting and job search system Dartmouth students have used for the past six years.
Though the switch to DartBoard occurred this summer, this Sunday's resum drop is the first time the new system will be used by a large number of Dartmouth students.
Career Services began considering a transition to a new system after the office "had a not-so-great year" with MonsterTRAK, according to Monica Wilson, the associate director of employer relations for Career Services. Wilson directed the DartBoard project. The new system was created and implemented after MonsterTRAK announced it would discontinue its InterviewTRAK program, the recruiting system previously used by the College.
MonsterTRAK was unreliable, had limited space for students to post information and the system was unable to track previously sent documents, Wilson said.
DartBoard accommodates 50 cover letters per user and also accepts 10 resums, 10 writing samples, 10 "other documents" and one unofficial transcript, according to the DartBoard web site. Each of these documents can be submitted and tracked directly through DartBoard, providing students with a clear record of their past activity, Wilson said.
"There's a calendar that shows you the date, time and location of the interviews [and deadlines] right on your home page. You can't miss it," Wilson said, highlighting an additional benefit of Dartboard.
Dartboard also lists jobs outside of the recruiting program. The national job listings are still provided by MonsterTRAK, and an additional job search option shows listings posted by employers specifically interested in hiring Dartmouth students, Wilson said. DartBoard links users to the Nationwide Internships Consortium, which, according to Wilson, provides access to listings for approximately 5,000 national and local internships.
"The system allows students to do more one-stop shopping," Wilson said.
The switch to DartBoard affects employers, who now need Career Service's permission before participating in the recruiting program or listing a job specifically for Dartmouth students.
Despite the changes, many seniors said they were indifferent to the switch.
"There's not a big difference," Jasmine Francis '09 said.
Many students acknowledged that they had not used the new program enough to notice a change, although more students will likely gain familiarity with the program after Sunday's resum-drop deadline.
"I would say 90 percent of the students apply the night of the deadline," Wilson said. "Last year, we had over 400 seniors who applied at the first deadline. I would expect similar numbers this time."
In the July 7 resum drop, 169 students used DartBoard to participate.
"It went smoothly, but it's a much smaller scale," Wilson said, adding that the system has not been in use long enough for Career Services to know how the switch will fully affect the recruiting process.
"We've had some wrinkles, which are fairly normal when you implement any new system of this size, but we've worked through them so far," she said. "Fall recruiting will be the big test."
Approximately 5,000 students and alumni are registered with DartBoard.
