Helping you jump-start your career

As a UNIGE Alumni member, you get full access to the Career Centre for the first two years after you graduate. The experts there will help you in your job search. The Careers Centre services include:

• individual appointments to get advice on looking for a job, including a review of your job applications, practice job interviews and help creating a career plan;
• workshops to help you create your career plan and identify your qualities, skills and job preferences;
• events with potential employers and other professionals, such as the “Nuit des Carrières” and faculty-specific forums (with stands and presentations by employers).

Ensuring a seamless transition from uni to the job market

Our mentoring programme is available to Master’s students and students in continuing education in all fields. The aim of the programme is to help students enter the world of work. We put students who are nearing the end of their studies in contact with professionals interested in sharing their knowledge. Each mentoring partnership is governed by an individual agreement, which sets out the aims of the partnership and how they will be achieved. Uni-emploi also runs two workshops: one on networking and the other on developing a career plan.

Successfully sharing knowledge

The surveys of mentoring participants show that most mentors feel that they did manage to successfully share their experiences with their mentees. And most of the students feel that the programme improved their knowledge of the world of work, gave them a better idea of their career plan and helped them enter the job market more easily.

Working with student associations to share experiences

We support the Association des étudiants en Sciences (AESc), which regularly holds “Wisdom Sharing” events, in which alumni from the Science Department are invited to come and talk to the students about their careers, the world of work and the latest developments in the job market. After a brief talk by two or three alumni and a Q&A session, students get to network with the alumni over a drink.

The Humanities Department’s students’ association also began organizing similar events in 2019, and has so far held three evenings with alumni and students. Given the success of these events, we plan to extend them to other faculties as well.

Would you like to share your experience?
Whatever the section you attended, whether your career is scientific or atypical, whether you are “junior” or “senior” in your profession, by registering at this address: wisdom.sharingunige@gmail.com AESc will receive the registrations and will inform you of your participation in one of the upcoming evenings.

The value of work experience

Thanks to the University of Geneva’s pioneering “validation of prior experience” initiative, you can now get your non-academic knowledge and skills recognized, in order to obtain your degree more quickly. If you have prior experience, you might be able to get an exemption from certain courses in your study plan.

Three faculties and two institutes are now using this system, which supports lifelong learning: the Science, Psychology and Educational Science, and Social Sciences departments and the Computer Science Centre (CUI) and the University Institute of Teacher Education (IUTE).