On Feb. 24 from 1-4:30 p.m. in Lankford Ball- room, the Cook-Cole College of Arts and Sciences Student Advisory Board and Assistant Director of the Academic & Career Advising Center Sarah Hobgood hosted SANE, or the Student-Alumni Networking Event.
On an email sent out by the Longwood University Academic & Career Advising Center, the event description read "alumni from various career fields are coming here to talk to you about how they found their careers and give advice for pre- paring for life after Longwood. This is a great way to learn advice for a tough job market and build your network."
Much in the form of a Career and Internship Fair, but on a smaller scale, SANE consisted of alumni professionals standing at small tables organized around the ballroom floor. With business cards and information packets drawn, the alumni talked to interested students on their respective plans and concerns for a life beyond college. With their best manners drawn, the students and alumni met and exchanged perspectives in a controlled and friendly environment. There were 20 alumni accounted for at the event.
Among them included former majors in Communications Studies, Business Administration, Art, Modern Languages, Liberal Studies, History, Social Work, Chemistry, Sociology, Biology, Psychology, Economics, English, Political Science and Physics. In this wide representation of majors, there were an equally large number of career paths. These included Financial Representative, Sales Engineer, Teaching, Diabetes Care Specialist and High Education.
Many times, the major did not line up with the career path and, just as often, they did as can be demonstrated by Cameron Patterson, a former History major, having a career in Disability Services, and also former Modern Languages major Lynne Grosso who works as a German teacher.
As an example of the cases in which career did follow major, the alumni concentrated their field of study into a specific interest of life's work. This phenomenon can be described with former Sociology major Marquis Mapp's involvement with Crossroads Prevention Services, an organization offering services to grade schoolers, concerning drug and violence awareness programs.
As a former Biology major, Robert Parker advised students to open themselves up to opportunities outside of the range of their major and take the blinders off of their eyes.
Available to speak was a student working at the event, Crystal Peoples. Peoples, a senior Mathematics major and Sociology minor, is a member of Cormier Honors College, the Longwood University Math Club, Pi Mu Epsilon Math Honors Society, Alpha Kappa Delta Sociology Honors Society, PRIDE and the Cook-Cole College of Arts and Sciences Student Advisory Board. First involved withSANE through her work with the Cook-Cole Col- lege of Arts and Sciences Student Advisory Board, Peoples says she has "participated in this event twice now and really [enjoys] helping out."
Peoples said, "Working at the event is always fun for me because I like being able to give people guidance when they come." She says this guidance is necessary because "most people come to the event and don't know very much about what goes on during it, and I like being able to allay concerns and help people make the most of the experience."
Peoples finished by saying, "As I am getting ready to graduate, I will not work for the event again; however, I look forward to the day I receive an email asking me to come back as an alumni."
SANE is an event at which Longwood students meet people who were in their position and, be they graduates from 2011 or 1995, the connection is just as important at a school that is both rapidly changing and vastly traditional. Part of the University's traditional aspect might be its place not only as an institution but also as a family that cares for its members.
For this reason, similar to how older siblings help their younger brothers and sisters, the event not only works, but is also highly beneficial. It represents the act of taking out time from a constantly busy schedule to advise others for no monetary gain.
The true gain is to be satisfying a loyalty to one's Alma mater and the comfort of having possibly made someone else's life a little easier. It is for this reason that Peoples wants to come back as an alumnus for love of her school and to help others. Many students may feel the same and hopefully get the opportunity to step back into this short, fruitful period of their lives.
