How are recent Colorado College grads faring in a challenging job market? We asked, and we found them pursuing exciting and meaningful new adventures all across the globe. A feature on our website at http://www.coloradocollege.edu/recentgrads has recent grads telling their stories about their transition from CC to career.

The webpage was created by Arielle Gross ’12, video and digital media specialist at CC, who said she felt the project was important so that “people realize many of our most recent grads are putting the skills they learned at CC to use.” 

The interviews were conducted by student writing interns Kelly Varian ’13 and Laura Blackett ’13.

Caroline Janeway ’11

Caroline Janeway ’11, a neuroscience/dance double major, is currently a research assistant at the University of Texas at Dallas. 
She was previously a resident artist at Taipei Artist Village in Taiwan, and performed her original choreography at top Taipei dance venues.

“The opportunity to pursue both dance and neuroscience is what pulled me to CC. The Block Plan was very valuable in that I could study neuroscience from nine until noon and then dance was always a part of my life in the afternoons. Not many other schools will allow you to do this. My professors’ openness in allowing me to join my two majors was crucial to my success after college. For my thesis, I did movement therapy with a Parkinson’s patient. The experience that I gained doing this hands-on therapy was huge in helping me land a great job out of college.

“The doctors I work with now almost exclusively hire liberal arts graduates because we are deeply passionate about our work and have interests outside of neuroscience to keep us going,” Janeway said.

Catherine Belton ’11

Art conservationist
 Catherine Belton ’11 was a biology major with a focus in studio art and art history at CC. She also completed Harvard University’s six-week intensive design program.

“Restoring art requires heavy chemistry to understand materials, art history to appreciate the periods of the pieces you handle, and studio art to execute hands-on restoration techniques. As I apply to master’s programs in arts conservation that require coursework in language, cultural anthropology, art history, art studio, and chemistry, I am thrilled to have had the CC education I did. Because I was able to do exactly what I wanted block by block, I have the majority of these requirements done already.”

“I had a huge leg up at the Harvard program. It was really hard for a lot of people and it was not for me; it simply felt like a longer block. Other students spent their entire summer in the lab, but because of the time management skills I took away from CC, I was able to explore Boston, meet new people, and get a rewarding internship,” Belton said.

Lee Carter ’12

Lee Carter ’12 is an investment analyst at Invested Development in Boston. He was a mathematical economics major and did a total of three internships while at CC.

“While studying abroad in Ghana, I met someone who worked for Invested Development (who went on to start our Kenya office) and he told me about impact investing and brought me in for a summer internship in my junior year. I then worked part-time as an intern from Colorado Springs for my senior year and was hired full-time starting in July. I undertook three internships during my time in college and believe they were all incredibly useful in terms of learning different industries and what I wanted to do. My final internship led directly to a full-time offer.

“The Block Plan has definitely helped me in terms of meeting quick goals and working on projects with fast due dates. It also allows me to be able to focus on an important project when I need to, while still keeping other projects in my head and getting them further along as well. I have had plenty of situations like this already and do attribute my success in those situations to the Block Plan.

“I think the biggest thing about CC that has given me a leg up and will continue to do so is the out-of-the-box thinking that the professors instill. The ability to think about problems from different angles and fresh ideas has really helped me to push our company further with our initiatives and allowed for greater activity with what we are doing,” Carter said.

To read more stories of recent grads, go to http://www.coloradocollege.edu/recentgrads