HIPAL Volunteer Opportunities
Professional development program
The support of Hamline alumni is what drives the HIPAL program and enables us to provide constructive, meaningful, and up-to-date programming. Alumni volunteers provide valuable insight into the current job market and professional environment so the HIPAL program can better prepare its student members to be "day one career ready." Hamline alumni can support the HIPAL program in a number of ways, which are listed below.
If you would like to volunteer in any capacity please email Karla Williams, HIPAL interim director at hipal@hamline.edu.
HIPAL networking mixer events
Throughout the academic year, HIPAL hosts Networking Mixer Events. The goal of these events is that HIPAL students will gain insight into the expectations and opportunities in a professional environment while crafting their networking skills, professional goals, and communications skills. Business and academic professionals, both alumni and friends, provide their expertise and knowledge to the HIPAL students at these events and are a critical component for the success of the mixer. Our HIPAL students have a variety of career goals and are eager to interact with professionals from a variety of organizations. Given the students’ diverse set of interest areas, we look for volunteers from the fields of mathematics, physics, chemistry, biology, engineering, and medicine, to name a few, who will share their stories and provide advice.
HIPAL guest speakers
Every semester HIPAL brings in business and academic professionals to lend their expertise on a variety of topics that will help prepare students for their future career endeavors. Below is a list of topics that guest speakers have addressed. We are always looking for speakers and new topics that will be of value for our HIPAL students and provide a direct tie to the employer Valued Characteristics of Graduates.
- Workplace readiness and cultural competency in industry
- One's career arc and the realities of interviewing in the current job market
- Entrepreneurship in the sciences
- Industrial design and design thinking
- Innovation
- Intellectual property and conflict of interest
- How students can build their network
- Team building and conflict resolution
- Strategies on meeting management
- Communicating through the generations: Phone skills for Gen Z
- Financial planning for your future
- Negotiation 101: Strategies to increase effectiveness
- The art of critical decision making
- Effective “gap year” experiences
HIPAL Career mentors
Students greatly benefit from one-on-one discussions with business and academic professionals who have experience in the field or career they are interested in pursuing. Throughout the HIPAL program, students are required to engage professionals in several informational interviews and connect through LinkedIn. These interactions enable students can learn about careers, planning for those careers, and better understand the roles and responsibilities of individuals in those careers.
If you are interested in supporting any of these activities, please email Karla Williams, HIPAL interim director at hipal@hamline.edu.
