The 2019 Career Expo remains a significant event for UMP students and employers who participated in the exhibition organised by the university’s Student and Graduate Placement Department.
For one day only, UMP students and graduates from all faculties of the university had the opportunity to meet and engage with potential employers and get to understand the job market.
Students and Graduates Senior Manager, Mr Raymond Mkhwanazi, said the purpose of the Career Expo was for potential employers to showcase their offering and for students to get to know more about opportunities that lie ahead for them.
“We want to see our students empowered with tools for their next phase in life, which is job hunting and the workplace. We want to ensure that graduates get jobs or and internships.”
“This one day event was massive. The turnout was impressive. We saw more companies take part this year. We had 29 companies participate in the expo. Most have been with us since inception and some joined this year to make it bigger and better,” Mkhwanazi added.
“It was heart-warming to witness the campus come alive with interactions from students and employers. We hope students will not take this opportunity for grated.”
One of the companies present at the 2019: Career Expo was Halls Property Group, which was represented by Human Resource Manager, Sandile Lamani, who said that their aim was to assist agriculture students.
“Halls runs learnership programmes, internships, and graduate placement. We take between six and eight learners for the learnership, for the internship we looking students who haven’t completed their qualification yet, so that gain experience as part of their qualification requirement. “
Lamani further added that the graduate placement programme take students who have already completed their studies and are in need of experience.
UMP students honoured the invitation and came out in numbers. One of those that attended the expo was Lindiwe Zwide, who spoke highly of the organisation put together by the university. She said her reason to come to the expo was to engage with SANParks: Kruger National Park, as it is more aligned to her career.
The 2019 Career Expo kick started with a light dinner the day before, where the Vice-Chancellor, Professor Thoko Mayekiso welcomed the exhibitors and thanked them for partnering with the university.
Some of the companies that exhibited at the Career Expo include: SETAs, SANParks, PPECB, DRDLR, ABSA, Standard Bank, and the Department of Labour.
The 2019 Career Expo is the second leg at the university’s attempt to empower students and graduates get ready for the workplace. Earlier this year, UMP together with the Department of Labour had a workshop to train students on CV writing and interviewing skills.