College Students Shadow Alumni Professional, Personal Lives
For many young people, it can be difficult picturing what life after college could look like. A 2023 survey found nearly one-third of high school graduates are not sure where they want to be in their education or career path.
Job shadows provide students with a low-stakes opportunity to engage in a workplace to gain deeper insight into company culture and daily habits of working individuals.
An externship experience at Grinnell College in Iowa goes one step further and places students in homestays with alumni over spring break, giving them a peek behind the curtain to the work-life balance and habits of alumni in their intended industry.
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The program launched in 2012 as an opportunity to provide students with short-term job-shadowing opportunities during spring break.
“Students really get to see not just what work life is like out in the world, but also what work-life management is,” said Robin Bourjaily, assistant director in Grinnell’s Center for Careers, Life and Service.
For international students in particular, the experience can show the norms and cultures of an American workplace. But all students can benefit from the experience.
“First-year students I meet with, I often ask them what their family members do, and sometimes they know and sometimes they don’t, like, ‘Well, my dad goes to an office,’” Bourjaily says. “They might know their job title, but they don’t really know.”
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Experiential learning can provide students with important insight into their career preferences. A winter 2023 survey by Inside Higher Ed and College Pulse found students credit internships and other hands-on learning with helping them realize which career fields they do (55 percent) or do not (22 percent) want to pursue, as well as the tasks they enjoy and their own suitability to an industry.
To be considered, students must complete an application that includes writing letters to each host program they’re interested in shadowing. Staff share applications with hosts, who rank their top applicants, and then staff make the final matching decisions.
In addition to prioritizing student and host preferences, staff try to arrange matches in a way that maximizes the number of participants. On average, around 50 percent of students land a job-shadow opportunity, and only a few hosts will be passed over.
Student Beatriz Polo Diz (left) interned at the Nebraska Legislative Fiscal Office with alumna Mikayla Findlay.
Beatriz Polo Diz/Grinnell College
Hosts are typically alumni or Grinnell parents, and they agree to allow students to participate in their workplace for three to five days. Most hosts also allow students to stay with them, and those who cannot accommodate the learner are paired with another local graduate who provides housing.
“[Students] can really see this alum’s personal and professional life,” said Jessica Stewart, senior associate director of alumni and donor relations. “They get a holistic look at what it means to be them. They get to see the professional side [at work], but also how they manage their personal lives, whether, like, volunteering, managing the household, cooking dinner—all these things that come into play and that are a really big part of life after Grinnell.”
Prior to participating in the experience, students attend two orientations and meet with their host via video calls. Homestay hosts pass a background check before students stay with them, and many are repeat hosts with a history of receiving Grinnell students.
Students are responsible for managing their own travel. This helps alleviate some of the work required of staff members and also boosts students’ self-efficacy because they must coordinate their arrival and departure with their host.
Most students receive financial support from the college, depending on their level of need or the distance of travel to their host site (regional, domestic or international).
Most of the opportunities (and the more popular offerings) take place in person, but since 2021 the college has also offered virtual offerings to accommodate additional students and alumni.
Student Julian Kopelman (left) shadowed alumnus Tom Daniel, director of city planning and community development in Salem, Mass.
Julian Kopelman/Grinnell College
“We have some hosts who do a wonderful job with virtual [shadowing], but they’re not as popular. For some students, they’re just right, but I think the best are the opportunities when students really get to be a fly on the wall during the day but also may have one-on-ones with people, maybe go to meetings, perhaps some sort of sample project that would be similar to the kind of work they would do if they worked there,” Bourjaily said.
After returning from their externship, students complete a postevaluation and submit a reflection essay and photos from their experience.
Over the past decade, the program has supported hundreds of students as they’ve pursued their career goals. This spring, 95 students shadowed 82 hosts in 24 states as well as in Singapore and India and online.
One of the benefits of the program is helping students connect their college experience to a specific job and identifying possible career paths, Bourjaily said. Some students have even landed internships because of their externships.
Student David Rhoades (left) shadowed alumnus Deepit Chandgothia at Wellmark Blue Cross and Blue Shield.
David Rhoades/Grinnell College
Additionally, students gain social capital through their relationships with their hosts. “Alumni are eager in sharing their connections and helping the student network,” Stewart said. “We really hope that these connections are not just three- to five-day-long relationships. We really hope that these are lasting relationships that will benefit the student in the long run and for their career after Grinnell.”
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