Upcoming Alumni Career Panel Encourages Huskies to Make History! 

Submitted by Emma R Hinchliffe on

We’ve all experienced it, that small silence after you tell someone you’re interested or are majoring in History. Promptly followed by “Oh, so what are you hoping to do with that then?” This can be both a frustrating and overwhelming question because there are so many things that you can do with a history degree! Where do you want to go? What career will you forge? And how on earth will you get there? 

On Thursday, November 16, the Department of History invites all current and prospective history students and majors to attend Huskies Make History: Learning from Failure Alumni Career Panel, an event designed to help you answer these questions!

Learning from failure.

Organized through the Huskies Make History program, the panel will feature recent history alumni and focus on their experiences during their time at UW and after graduation. They’ll be sharing their thoughts on how their education in history, and the skills they developed from this training, propelled and helped them in their subsequent careers to "make history." They’ll also be discussing some of the biggest challenges and failures they faced along the way... because changing the world is no easy task!

Each panel member has forged their own unique path, representing the diverse places where the major can take you. 

Teaching the next generation.

One of the speakers will be Jerome Hunter. Born and raised in Spokane, WA, Jerome graduated from the UW in 2007 and is currently teaching World History at the middle school level. He has fond memories of his time in the department and credits the training he received here with giving him "the confidence to teach by challenging me in ways that made me grow, not only as a student, but also as a person."

He was drawn to history precisely becuase of the diversity of topics it offered. History seemed to "synthesize other subjects like psychology and sociology in a unique way that made learning interesting... and that was really  exciting!" During his major Jerome considered careers in law and education but "after some reflection and serious consideration chose to become a public school teacher here in Seattle."

"If one can consistently and truly evaluate their failures, I believe they will eventually do something special."

Hunter is brutally honest when it comes to the challenges he faced as an undergraduate. “My failures were so constant that there isn’t one fail that particularly sticks out!” But "I allowed, and continue to allow, my failures to be informative and transfer into opportunities for growth.  If one can consistently and truly evaluate their failures, I believe they will eventually do something special."

Also speaking at the event are Kristin Ebeling, who went into the world of non-profits, creating the extremely successful Skate Like a Girl - an organization that promotes female empowerment through skateboarding - and Jane Park who now works in technical recruitment for one of the biggest broadcasting companies in the world.  

We’re very proud to call them our own!

Forge your path. 

One of the most exciting things about majoring in history is the plethora of skills it will help you develop, from critical thinking and communication, to learning how to construct a compelling and successful argument. But this can have its problems when it comes to narrowing down a career path. So come along on November 16  to learn from those who’ve risen to the challenge and start exploring your options alongside like-minded huskies.

Huskies Make History: Learning from Failure Alumni Career Panel takes place on Thursday, November 16, 4-5:30pm in Smith Hall Freedman Remak History Community Room (320).

For those who can’t attend this time around the History Fellows program will be hosting another alumni panel on career planning and development in Winter Quarter 2018. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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