The University of Arkansas at Little Rock’s Career Center will soon introduce a new tool to connect students with future employers.  

Beginning Dec. 4, students will have access to Handshake – a career network tailored to college students. The digital platform system is easy to use and allows users to customize every step of their career development journey – from searching jobs and internships to making an appointment with a career advisor to getting alerts about career fairs and workshops on campus.

“Handshake is like a one-stop shop for all things career,” said Lisa Henderson-Davis, director of Distributed Learning and Career Center. “It’s an online job recruiting platform that allows us to partner with employers to provide meaningful work opportunities for students seeking internships and part-time and full-time jobs.”

In Handshake, students set up their profile with their name and major and upload their work history, education, and resume.  

“Students can specify job fields they are most interested in, and then they will get  recommendations based on their background,” Henderson-Davis said. “It’s more individualized and personalized.”

More than 300,000 employers—from Fortune 500 companies to startups—are already on Handshake looking for students and recent graduates to fill job and internship openings, she said. More than 700 universities nationwide are using Handshake to help their graduates find jobs. In Arkansas, UA Fayetteville, Arkansas Tech, and UA Pine Bluff are also using Handshake.

 “We investigated other platforms for connecting employers and students, and we chose Handshake because of its vast network of employers both in state and nationwide,” said Dr. Sarah Beth Estes, associate provost for community, careers, and extended education.

Current UA Little Rock students will get an email on Tuesday, Dec. 4, containing a link to Handshake. Joining isn’t automatic. Students must click a link to activate their account to participate and then log in to Handshake with their NetID and password to complete their profiles and start connecting to new opportunities.

On the first log in, Handshake encourages students to upload their education, employment, and extracurricular activities. Once the profile is completed, students can set their preferences to receive suggested jobs and/or internships in the cities and fields they are looking to pursue.

An app is also available in the App Store and on Google Play so that students can receive timely notifications to their phones on job application updates, career events on campus, and when their favorite companies post jobs.

Starting Jan. 1, UA Little Rock’s Career Center will discontinue uploading job postings it receives from employers to the ualr.edu/careers website.