High school can be a great time to start looking for ways to make money which is one of the reasons why Professional Communication has started their most recent project on job résumés and interviews.

“I tell my students every semester,” teacher Nicholas Dion said. “This is the most important thing we do all year.”

During this project, students are required to create their own résumé for a job of their choice and are then interviewed for that position.

“The biggest purpose for the assignment is two-fold,” Dion said. “First, it gives students the opportunity to have a readily available résumé for jobs that they can apply for while in high school. The other purpose is to prepare students for real-life interviews.”

Dion hopes for students to come out of the class more prepared for the moment they are interviewed for their “dream job”, and to also greater understand how important a first impression can be, especially when applying for a career.

“I think it has better prepared me for future interviews along the way,” senior Lila Isabella Gonzalez said. “I did pretty well on this assignment, so I won’t feel as nervous on a real interview since I seem to do well on this one. It also gave me more of an idea of what a job interview will be like and how to answer unprepared questions.”

This assignment has set a more realistic standard for students while also allowing them to get creative. During the course of this assignment, students are also given the choice of dressing up for the interview.

“I think our job application assignment from professional communication is very helpful to students,” Gonzalez said. “It prepares not just the mindset but how you want your résumé to look.”

Preparation can be important when it comes to job applications, and this project can help students with little to no experience of jobs practice and refine their presentation, similar to sophomore Tara Godarzi Nia.

“I definitely think this assignment has better prepared me,” Nia said. “I have never been to an interview before so I found it interesting, and having a résumé if a plus. I find this project helpful, since now I have an idea of what an actual job application would be like.”

This job application project gives students a more practical image of where they see themselves in the future, along with how they should act in a certain scenario.

“I think this gives students the opportunity to be prepared for interviews that they will have down the line,” Dion said. “It allows them to think on their feet – to dig in and be creative.”