Britney Underwood - Wrapping Up Year 2

​Hey guys, its Brit, still here serving with Lawrence Tech! As my second year comes to a close many people have asked me, “why are you staying for a third year?” and my answer is simple: to gain as much experience as possible. I know there are better paying jobs out there, but since I planned to go to graduate school in Student Affairs (which is the field I’m doing as a VISTA at LTU) I figured I could use this last and final year to reflect, gain knowledge and most importantly gain outstanding connections in service. I have nothing but great things to reflect on as a second year VISTA, including managing the new systems that the Career Services utilize, an amazing career and money literature collaboration with Kevin Cunningham and 

participating in wonderful events, workshops, and conferences. LTU has a lot of culture and I am honored to be embraced by the many cultures here. I was able to participate in an event of the Hindu culture called Diwali, which is a festival celebrated every year both in the Hindu culture as well as with students of the Hindu culture here at LTU. I was able to sing and dance with students, as well as learn about and embrace their celebration and norms. It was an enlightening experience to say the least!

​One of the new events that we had this year was “Career Week,” which consisted of a week of career related events. This week included HotSpots, where we would have pop up stations on campus for students to speak with us about their resume, cover letters and career advice. It also included Speed Interviewing, the Career Fashion show, The Future’s Fair, and the Etiquette Dinner which all were amazing and fun events that engaged a lot of students. We were also able to host an event called “Future So Bright” in collaboration with the National Society of Black Engineers Junior Chapter (NSBE Jr.) which encouraged students to live and work in the Metro Detroit area. We were able to tour a design company name Vectorform in Royal Oak and Hello World in Southfield and each company gave us a lot of unique information about their company as well as held a special event for the NSBE Jr. We have had over 80 events which included speaking in classrooms, workshops, career fairs, career week, company crawl and we don’t plan on stopping soon! We have a strong connection to our students through our wonderful student assistants whom we love dearly. I am glad to be asked to come back for a final year and rock LTU one last time with this wonderful team! I’ve enjoyed all of the people I’ve met and connected with, all of the collaborations and events we have led. I can tell my last year will be my best year but my second year was beyond amazing!