CMU students meet up with prospective employers

Students pursuing their Masters degree at the Carnegie Mellon University Rwanda on Saturday met with 23 prospective employers from both the public and private sectors to learn more about what is expected of them in the job market.The students, who were 49 in number, met human resource managers and experts from their fields of study in a career information sharing session which saw them acquire tips they would need when searching for jobs or developing solutions and products for the companies.“This is part of preparation in getting the students to understand what kind of jobs they can do. They learn how to present themselves to companies from such meetings such that at the end of the day we are making sure the engineering graduates are successful in their lives,” said Michel Bezy, associate director at the university.Denise Umunyana, head of human resources at Airtel Rwanda, said the session helped students meet employers and understand the latter’s expectations which help them to suit themselves for the job market.“For example, at Airtel we have an outsourcing model and work with partners who include IBM, Ericsson and Comviva. I have seen that most of these students need to work with partners first in order to get hands-on experience because us at Airtel we are more into product development and management,” she explained.“I have seen some with the potential to move directly to Airtel but I have seen that many of them are into software and application development, which actually has more to do with our partners,” she said.She urged more career fairs in the country’s public and private universities for students to understand better which careers to pursue. Otherwise, she said, the numbers of youths who, each year fail to focus on their career development will eventually lead to mass unemployment in the country. The government targets to create 200,000 jobs per year under the Second Economic Development and Poverty Reduction Strategy. It is believed that through the Technical and Vocational Education and Training programmes and other private universities’ programmes like Carnegie Mellon University’s, the skills sector is on an upward trend, a plus for prospective employers.