GPA vs. Employment

College Majors Engineering Majors
1

<p>Okay... Their is a strong possibility that this question has been answered before;however, I was unable to find an answer that related to my circumstances. As graduation is approaching I would like to get some work experience under my belt, yet I have been extremely unsuccessful and I am positive it has everything to do with my GPA (understandably...I was very unsure about life my first two years of college). But I would like to know if their is anything I can do to increase my chances to find an internship or some type of employment with my GPA.</p>

<p>School: The Ohio State University
Major: Electrical and Computer Engineering (2010-2015)
Specification: Power
Minor: Nuclear Engineering
Job:Customer Service at a Hospital (1.5 years) and Research Assistant (1 year)
Publications: EChem Modeling:A Kinetic Model for Electrorefining
Cumulative GPA:2.42
Major GPA: 2.8</p>

<p>Am I a lost cost who spent a lot money for some card-stock?</p>

2

<p>First, when you apply for a job, dont put all the majors and minors in your resume, put only the ones that are targeted to that sector (especially leave nuclear engineering out unless you are applying for that industry). </p>

<p>This is from experience that if I leave my minor in (biomed) I have less success in getting an interview than if I just have electrical engineering on the resume.</p>

<p>Your GPA is a bit lower than what most companies consider entrance gpa for new grads, but you can make up for that in experience. Join some volunteering like ewb and be active in IEEE or other technology association at your locale and network. you could also be involve in university research so that it seems you are at least doing something relevant while looking for a job.</p>

<p>hope this helps.</p>

3

<p>Your cumulative is indeed very low… Leave it off your resume. Your major GPA is much higher but still low, at least lower than the cut-off for most companies. </p>

<p>That being said, a handful of companies/positions DO have cutoffs below 3.0. If I had to make a call, I would leave both GPAs off the resume and focus heavily on the layout of your resume. For instance, you could design the layout in a minimalist fashion to help hide the fact that your GPA is missing. If you design your resume in such a way, presumably the recruiter will be enamoured with other aspects of your resume and not the typical things he/she looks for. It’s all about setting yourself apart… in ANY way possible. Most recruiters are smart enough to read between the lines and a missing GPA will send up a red flag. If your resume stands out though, design wise, it may offset the missing GPA. It’s a hail mary pass, but worth a shot.</p>

<p>So in your case, since you’re trying to get your name on the map, focus on your resume design. You can run the design through a career services person at your school, or a head hunter to get a second opinion.</p>

<p>Check out something like this… <a href=“http://ginva.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/modern-and-professional-resume-template-examples-18.jpg[/url]”>http://ginva.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/07/modern-and-professional-resume-template-examples-18.jpg&lt;/a&gt;&lt;/p&gt;

4

<p>I was in a different industry, aerospace, and most companies I knew had the 3.0 GPA cutoff to even get a look. Even at that, we had so many resumes that the effective min GPA was more like 3.3 or 3.4. What that says is that you probably are out of luck finding a job at “the big boys” in your industry. I wouldn’t be looking at someone’s overall GPA, but the GPA in the areas where the classes were applicable to the job. However, that did mean I was looking at your freshman calc class for an engineering position.</p>

<p>However, all is not necessarily lost. Concentrate on the smaller companies. That means looking at Craig’s list and the like where a smaller company without a big recruiting budget will be placing their job postings. Smaller companies typically won’t have such a strict GPA cutoff.</p>

<p>Was your GPA going up within your field as you progressed thru school? When I was doing hiring, I would look at the trend of an applicant’s GPA. I found that those whose GPAs were trending up made good employees. They were getting more interested in their field as they went along. They were also “getting it” in their field which meant they had to learn what they should have before as those upper division classes build on the lower division classes. If this is the case, be sure to bring it up in any interview you have.</p>

<p>Might cost you some more money, but can you delay graduation a term or two. Take more classes in your major. You’ll have more knowledge which would make you more attractive. This can really work if you get good grades and bring up your GPA.</p>