As companies reassess their personnel structures in light of the economic crisis, many are re-evaluating their need for interns, according to Monica Wilson, associate director of employer relations at Career Services. Many businesses have also slowed their recruiting efforts at the College and delayed making job offers to students.
"Part of the indecision for employers is making their minds up as to how many spots they're going to have," Wilson said. "It's not necessarily, 'How many people are we going to lay off?' It's just, 'What are our overall needs going to be?'"
Many companies have not finished their recruiting process, and only a few have submitted final counts of the number of students they will accept, Wilson said, making it difficult to speculate about the scale of the hiring reduction.
While the hiring process has been slower this year than in previous recruitment cycles, businesses have continued to contact Career Services about recruiting on campus, Wilson said. Several prominent companies, including Goldman Sachs and Time Warner, will continue to recruit during the Spring term, she said.
"Things are moving more slowly, but it's encouraging to see we're still getting phone calls [from employers]," she said.
Wilson declined to release the names of major recruiters that had scaled back their efforts this year, but said that fewer investment banks participated "because they no longer exist or their hiring was down substantially."
Career Services maintained interest from consulting firms and attracted some new employers, she said.
Other Ivy League universities are experiencing similar trends in recruiting. Officials who manage student employment at Princeton University and Wesleyan University told The Dartmouth that many employers have scaled back, or not yet completed, their hiring efforts.
Employers seem to be waiting to do "just-in-time hiring" for next year, planning to hire new employees after the companies have determined space still exists for additional staff, according to Michael Sciola, director of the Career Resource Center at Wesleyan. A larger portion of the available jobs are now at smaller firms and in cities other than New York, although Wesleyan students who have been offered jobs at larger investment firms on Wall Street have kept them thus far, Sciola added.
"Now I'm hearing more interest in Chicago and Atlanta, [Washington, D.C.] and Boston, which is great, because this is the year you want to be flexible," Sciola said.
Companies are likely to extend 15 percent fewer offers to students at the University of Pennsylvania this year as compared with last year, Patricia Rose, Penn's director of Career Services, said.
"The economic conditions are the reason," Rose said. "Some employers cancelled their visits completely. Others scaled back the number of students they interviewed, and that continues to be true in the spring."
Rose has advised students to be flexible when they consider internship offers and to be willing to consider different industries, employers and compensation packages, she said. Some students are also considering attending graduate school, while others are joining multi-year service organizations, including Teach for America and the Peace Corps, she added.
Many graduating Dartmouth students have also chosen to apply for service-related positions. As of February, 9 percent of the Class of 2009, or roughly 95 students, had applied to join Teach for America, according to a statement from the organization to accepted applicants.
Career Services is organizing two new efforts to offer students additional employment opportunities, Wilson said, including a "Job Jam" program, which reaches out to people affiliated with the College, including parents and alumni, to help students search for jobs.
"We are in the process of sending out communications to close to 30,000 people," Wilson said.
Career Services is also partnering with Green Corps, one of the College's fundraising arms, for the month of April to contact alumni and encourage them to post all known job opportunities on the Career Services web site, Wilson said.
The message is, "if you have jobs, send them to Dartmouth," Wilson said, adding that many jobs are being filled by "word of mouth."
Career services will also hold "Job Jolt" on April 2, an event for graduating seniors that aims to connect students with available jobs, teach students how to identify job openings and review networking strategies, Wilson said.
Career Services is trying to reach out to students, especially because many seniors have not contacted their office this year, Wilson said.
"We weren't seeing as many seniors coming in as we had hoped," Wilson said. "Students are not sure what to do because all they're hearing is the dim and gloom. Our goal is to say that there are jobs out there."
Dartmouth students are fortunate to have an alumni network that is "so supportive," Wilson said.
"You shouldn't wait -- there are jobs out there," she said. "You have to look harder, lift up the rocks and beat the bushes to be successful."
Staff writer Susan Matthews contributed to the reporting of this article.
