Get started on your internship search and career preparation with the ASPIRE Program or the INSPIRE Program.
ASPIRE Program (Accelerated Success Professional Readiness Education) is our career readiness program for Pace undergraduate students and has everything you need to achieve your internship and job goals. Get access to our workshops and online guides to gain the skills, connections, and opportunities that will help you secure a great internship and design your career path!
- For domestic students of all majors
INSPIRE Program (International Student Professional Readiness Education) is a required program for Pace international students who wish to pursue employment in the US and contains everything you need to secure a great position. Students will learn about career options for their major and gain the skills to self-advocate about their employment eligibility and professional strengths.
- Required for F-1 Visa students of all majors
When to get started on your Internship Search
When deciding when to begin your career preparation, consider internship hiring timelines.
- Generally, mid-sized and smaller companies, non-profits/government, and start-ups hire a semester before the internship starts.
- Larger brand companies including accounting, financial services, banking, hospitals, big tech, and media brands have earlier recruitment deadlines. They can start recruiting for opportunities 1 year – 18 months in advance.
The 1st step of our ASPIRE and INSPIRE internship preparation programs is to explore and join the Career Communities!
No matter what you choose to study, you have many career paths in front of you, and Career Services can help you explore and narrow the options through our Career Communities.
Explore: Career Communities
How can I join a Career Community?
Join 1-2 Career Communities to be notified about internships, jobs, and events just for you. Update anytime!
Can I change my mind about my Career Communitiy?
Yes, we encourage you to test-drive Career Communities by participating in skill-building activities, such as joining student organizations, on-campus labs, micro-internships, or even internships! Afterward, reflect on your experience and recalibrate your course.
A Career Counselor can help you evaluate your experience and course correct, as needed. Schedule an appointment:
The 2nd step of our ASPIRE and INSPIRE internship preparation programs includes designing a resume that highlights skills employers need to get the job you want!
Follow these steps to create a resume that gests the interview.
1
Complete the Rock your Resume Workshop to access our proven Resume Templates for your Career Community.
2
Score your resume with our AI-based tool, Resume Worded, for instant feedback. This tool will help you get 5x more interviews!
3
Schedule an appointment with a Career Counselor to finalize your resume and discuss your career goals. *This step is required for the ASPIRE Program badge.
Only if you enjoy rejection! 🙂
Please do not use an old resume to apply – only the Career Services Resumes are designed to clear virtually any screening software. That is key to getting your resume to be seen by a Hiring Manager and being selected for an interview!
Here is why this happens:
When applying online, your resume is initially screened by an Applicant Tracking System (ATS). On average, an ATS rejects 75% of resumes due to formatting issues or lack of keywords (see “Resume Keywords” section below).
Research also shows that HR Managers spend about 6.5 seconds reviewing a resume, so your resume must be concise, error-free, and easy to read.
Our Resume Templates are created to be just that!
The Benefits of the Career Services Resume Templates:
- The template format is designed to help you clear an ATS,
- The resume templates are specific for each Career Community, so they are already targeted to your career goals, and
- Employers tell us how much they appreciate our easy-to-read format!
The Benefits of using our AI tool, Resume Worded:
Additionally, our AI tool, Resume Worded, will score your resume to give you instant feedback and increase your chances of being selected for an interview by 5x!
The Pace Career Services office is one of the largest career centers in academia, and we have a dedicated team of Career Counselors who come from a variety of academic and professional disciplines.
Each School has a dedicated team of experienced Career Counselors. To find your team of Counselors, just select your School from the menu below:
To begin working with a Career Counselor, register for our workshops or schedule an appointment.
The Benefits of Internships for your Career
Internships are also the best way to explore career options and prepare for your desired job!
In fact, graduates are more likely to find a great job after graduation if they have had an Internship experience than if they have not! Here are some statistics:
- 70% of all interns — both paid and unpaid — are offered a position with the company that they interned with.
- 60.8% of internships are paid positions.
- In the first few post-graduation years, former interns are 15% less likely to be unemployed and earn 6% more than students who did not intern.
- 49% of employers would be much more likely to hire college graduates who completed an internship, irrespective of major.
- Students with internship experience are 35% more likely to get at least one job offer after graduating than those without internship experience.
- Employers say time and again that a relevant internship experience carries much more weight in their hiring decisions than a candidate’s major or GPA. Indeed, having an internship experience is the single most influential factor that employers consider when making hiring decisions.
When should I do an internship?
You can participate in an internship as early as your freshman year or your first semester! You don’t have to decide on your ultimate career goals to intern. An internship is the perfect way to test-drive career options and learn first-hand what the day-to-day of the job looks like.
If you are in your senior year or in your final semester, it is also never too late!
How can I find an internship?
The 3rd step of our ASPIRE and INSPIRE internship preparation programs includes strategies for applying for internships and jobs. For instance,
- Register for our Strategies to Get Hired Workshop.
- Attend our employer events and career fairs!
- Apply for internships via Handshake, where 120,000+ opportunities were posted just last year for Pace students and graduates!
- Apply less and interview more by targeting your resume to each position using Resume Worded’s Targeted Resume tool!
Congratulations on completing the program!
**The ASPIRE and INSPIRE Program digital certification badge is distributed once per month.
Upon completion, look out for an email from Credly to accept your badge on the 1st day of the next month.**
This badge is highly impressive to employers, so be sure to add it to your LinkedIn profile.
See our FAQ about CPT:
Get Started
Register for
“Explore Career Communities and Get Started on your Internship Search”
Workshop
Or, contact us at careers@pace.edu.