1. Presented by
Andrew Harper, Manager of Employer Relations
Araceli “Sally” Pérez-Ramos,
Manager of Communications and Online Programs
Navigating the
Unchartered Waters of
Virtual Recruitment
Events

2. About St. Edward’s University
• Private liberal arts university
• Catholic, Holy Cross
• Undergraduate and graduate
degrees
• Approximately 5,200 students in
90 academic programs
• Traditional-aged & Non-traditional
student body
• Centralized Career Services Office
– 9 full time staff
– 10 student staff

3. What is a Virtual Career Fair?

4. What We Do
Employer Relations
• Manages employer contacts
• Oversees full time and part time job
postings
• Coordinates recruiting events on
campus
• Collects lots and lots of data
Technology
• Oversees all digital and social
media
• Manages online courses and
programs
• Develops marketing campaigns
• Accountable for all technology
magic in the office

5. PARAMETERS
• Budget
• Needed to be free for employers
• Interactive experience that could be monitored
• Video presence for employers
• Multi-day experience
• Short lead time for planning
• Wanted to be organic

6. PLATFORMS
Google
Hangout
Zoom GoToMeeting WebEx
Cost Free Free for 50 minutes Costly &
Complicated
University
Subscription
Features • Chat visible
• Required
students &
employers have
Google account
• Audience would
be public
• Only allowed
shared screen
• Weak varied
access levels
• No chat feature
• Had time
constrictions
• All participants
required to be
visible
• Weak varied
access levels
• Various chat
options
• Could send out
reminders and
post event
surveys
• Allowed for
PowerPoint
deck, shared
screen, and
video options
• Various access
levels
• Various chat
options
• Could send out
reminders and
post event
surveys
• Allowed for
PowerPoint
deck, shared
screen, and
video options
• Various access
levels
Ease of Use Easy Easy Moderate Complicated

7. Final Decision – Webex
• Free with university
subscription
• Pre Set-Up event link that could
be advertised
• Could pre-load employer slide
deck and screen share was
available
• Training was available through
OIT
• Career staff, employers, and
students/alumni all had
different access levels

8. Technology Set-up
• Hosted Virtual Fair on our university Wordpress Blog
– Could list the following on the blog page:
• Event links
• Description of employers and positions available
• Schedule of events
• Could later post video onto page for future views
• Used WebEx Event center option vs. Meeting Center option
– Could pre-schedule the event with uploaded Employer PowerPoint
– Ability to provide varied access
– Developed email templates to invite employers, students and alumni with
registration questions
– Ability to create post-event survey questions which are housed for 3 months
– Record sessions for later download

9. Virtual Career Fair Set-Up
• Six employers
• Each conducted a live,
30-60 minute session
• Encouraged to use a
slide deck and submit it
a head of time
• CAPD introduced
speaker and moderated
questions

10. Challenges
• Employers had to download WebEx in advance
• Schedule training time with employers
• Students had to download WebEx to either computer or mobile device
• Informing students they could either access from their own device or come into
the office

11. Marketing

12. Lessons Learned
• Attendance and survey information
disappears after 3 months
• 2 employers did not have webcams
• Need to partner with a class or
group to build attendance
• Employers wanted to “feel” more
connected with students
• Background for employer is
important
Would we do it again?

13. Questions?
Andrew Harper
Manager of Employer Relations
andrewh@stedwards.edu
Araceli “Sally” Perez-Ramos
Manager of Communications and Online Programs
aracelip@stedwards.edu
Find the Hilltopper Virtual Career Fair here!