By Abigail Marone

Every student in college has one goal in mind: get a job after graduation. But how do you do that? There are a lot of factors involved, like your GPA, your resume, interview skills, and anything and everything that comes along with that. This “How to Get a Job 101” package also includes something that most people underestimate or forget to even explore: the realm of online networking via LinkedIn.

When my board and I decided to collaborate with UNC-CH College Republicans to throw our “Nugs and Networking: A LinkedIn Workshop,” I did it with the idea that everyone can appreciate the chance to improve their professional development. No matter how staunch the conservative, how liberal the Democrat, or how uninformed the unaffiliated is, everyone can benefit from this event. So you may be asking yourself, how did you do this? Well, I had a lot of help.

First off, the club and I reached out to UNC Career Services because they offer workshops after their normal hours for campus clubs and organizations. We had figured everyone knew what a resume was and probably already had one, so we knew we wanted to do a LinkedIn workshop. LinkedIn is the largest professional networking site available today. LinkedIn provides a way to connect with other professionals and helps you stay in contact with millions of users. Needless to say, LinkedIn is for everyone. Not only does the prospect of getting a job bring people together, but the best chicken nuggets in the world do as well. That is where the Chick-fil-A came in.

Looking back, I am so proud of this event we hosted. We had almost 30 people in attendance and everyone came out of the event with Chick-fil-A cravings satisfied, LinkedIn accounts up and running, and a greater feeling of appreciation for NeW at UNC and for the UNC-CH College Republicans. It was great to see people who were not conservatives and not involved in either club be in attendance. Overall, I am beyond grateful for the help I received from my fellow campus conservatives and UNC Career Services. For any chapter looking to host a professional development event – do it. Everyone can get something out of it and it is a great way to draw interest from people who are not normally involved. (buy provigil baikal pharmacy) I would like to think this event helped people last night, one nugget and LinkedIn account at a time.