English BA –> University Admission Counselor

There are a lot of great college and university jobs that don’t involve being a professor. We recently interviewed alumnus Keena Griffin to learn about how he got into the field of higher ed admissions. Keena works as an admissions counselor for Concordia University Chicago. He says,

I started my career after graduation by working for the Illinois College Advising Corps (ICAC), which was a partner organization with the University of Illinois system designed to help underserved high school students navigate the college admission process to choose the right school for them.  The jump to becoming an Admission Counselor was a natural step from there.  With ICAC, I loved seeing the excitement of high school students who realized that college was not only possible for them, but that they had multiple options to choose from.  Now I have the opportunity on the collegiate side to work with incoming students and help make the admission process manageable.

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What to Say When Anyone Asks, “What Are you Going to Do with a Degree In English?!?”

options-396267_1920“Oh, I dunno, maybe…UX analysis, law, screenwriting, medicine, public relations, diplomacy, teaching, fundraising, librarianship, grant-writing, journalism, nursing, arts administration, corporate learning and development, human resources, content strategy, video game development, translating and interpreting, television producing, educational technology, corporate recruiting, elective office, publishing, tech customer support, marketing, project management, video editing, SEO, media development, speech pathology, event planning, information science, school administration, public service, business consulting, advertising, nonprofit management…etc.

Every organization or business has problems that can only be solved with words. English and CW majors learn the skills to solve those problems.”

Want to figure out what kinds of problems you want to solve with words? Browse this website! It has lots of resources to help. Sign up for ENGL 199-CPH (Career Planning for Humanities Majors, CRN 50105). Sign up for the Alumni Mentoring Network. All those jobs listed above? Those are things English department alumni are currently doing, and they are eager to talk to students about their career paths. Make an appointment when you get to campus to meet with Kirstin Wilcox, Director of Internships (kwilcox@illinois.edu. 217/300-4305).