Welcome -- we're glad you've found us!

    Thinking about your career means thinking backwards -- really. Start by projecting yourself in the ideal first job, then figure out how to get there. In this first section, we list a variety of current jobs (and recent internships) so you can start this process. Job requirements will tell you what skills you must possess. Course descriptions should tell you what skills you can expect to learn. (The whole of your education will be greater than the sum of these parts, but these parts are your basic building blocks.)

    You should think about what the job market is in the area you are interested in, what the entry-level requirements are for professional jobs in that field, what courses you should take to prepare yourself and what extra-curricular activities (volunteer work, internships, part-time jobs) to seek in order to enhance your marketability.

    The notion of yourself as "marketable" may sound a bit too vocational for an academic institution. View it more as a way to take your coursework seriously, to shape your academic career so you can do what seems most worthwhile or challenging to you after you graduate. Even if you totally change your mind about your life's direction (as many of us do), at least you will have built up some coherent sense of what you’re doing with your brief time as an undergraduate.

    While you are an undergrad, you have the opportunity to develop skills and methods of problem solving which will be invaluable in any vocation you choose. Your course selection, approach to course work, and job hunting are integrally related. Demonstrating a professional interest and skills in a field or set of public issues or policies is one of the best ways to make yourself marketable. By "professional," we mean systematically developing your background, knowledge base, skills and contacts over a 2-3 year period so that by the time you hit the job market, you will have the confidence that can come only from knowing what you know--and don't know--about your chosen field. Knowledge, enthusiasm and a good academic record all are important to getting that vital first job, but you must also have confidence in your skills and the ability to articulate them to convince an employer of your value.

    We don't have a course just for teaching you to articulate your skills, but if you continue to be aware of and note what you are learning as you continue taking courses, you will see your skill base grow. And, if you look ahead to the kinds of work you want to do, you can begin to build your skill set to match those required for the work you want to do. If you are aware of that process, you will be better prepared to articulate your value to employers.

 

Consider these jobs and internships lists as sets of ideas for beginning your own career exploration. Both job listings and internships archives are great resources for learning about what is required in various jobs and internships. Look at them before you finish all your coursework and before you've become desperate for a job or internship.

Current Jobs in Geography   Puget Sound/Pacific Northwest gives you local classifieds and US/World takes you to classifieds beyond this geographic area.

Selected Jobs for Geographers is a set of sample job listings (not current), that shows the kinds of jobs you can expect to fill if you have the appropriate coursework in your degree. We've divided the job areas according to the UW program options and we are building parallel lists of Websites that carry similar, but CURRENT job listings.

Internships  Look here for the Internship Guide for UW Geography Students, which also has a list of related Websites. There's a list of Recent Internships that other UW students have had and a Contact List for Potential Internships, particularly useful for the local Puget Sound area.

Skills Developed in Geography is a general list.
Top Ten Survival Skills for Geography Majors is well subtitled, "How to graduate on time and get the most out of the major."
Marketable Skills of Geography Majors lists job titles to consider and Skills to develop and put on your resums, with a list of courses in which you can get those skills.

 UW Alumni Job Titles contains a wide-ranging showcase of the many, many kinds of work that people who have studied geography at the UW are doing. It's another good place to start your backwards-thinking.
AAG Member Job Titles is an even wider listing of the kinds of work geographers do, at the Association of American Geographers Website.
AAG Career Center For more career information about geography, check here.

We plan to add to this Website as much as we can as soon as we can, but limited time and money invariably means it's taking too long. Nevertheless, in the not-too-distant future, look for sections on:

What Are UW Geographers Doing? Written by former students now in jobs around the country, this section will give you descriptions of their work, studies, plans and advice for current students.

Job Search -- How Geographers Can Find Jobs - A tool box that will begin with a brief description of what we're trying to accomplish here at the Department of Geography (Career Development Strategies) and then plunges into The Job Finding (and Getting) Process. It will show you how to get yourself most efficiently through the process. The bonus is that if you learn the process now, it will help you through the rest of your working life.
 
 

If you still have questions, or if you've run into any hot tips or interesting information for the rest of us, please let me know!

Kate Duttro
Career Resources Coordinator, Dept. of Geography
University of Washington
duttro@u.washington.edu
206/685-9693
 

To contact us: geogjobs@u.washington.edu
This file modified: Jan 19, 1998
kd

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