Conference attendance is a first in many ways

This year, Ally attended her first National Student Employment Conference. The National Student Employment Association hosts a conference every year for student employment professionals across the country. This year’s conference was in Baltimore, Maryland.

At the conference Ally was able to network with and meet folks from different institutions. Some topics Ally learned about were creating inclusive student employment practices, fostering engaging student employment programs, risk management for student employees, and professionalizing student employment on campus, among others. During one of the keynote sessions, an economist from Georgetown (Nicole Smith) shed light on the upcoming recession and the impact it will have on student employees. Ally learned about the changes in the workforce post covid and how student employees can appropriately market themselves based on the skillsets employers are looking for. 

Katie Block commented on Ally’s experience, stating, “Ally is the first RO representative to ever attend a [national] conference on student employment and is a reflection of the amazing work she has done transforming the student team.”

Ally was also able to connect with folks in the Financial Aid office at UW, Devin Deegan, Kristina Rittel, Kasie Strahl, and Justin Mumford. She had a great time exploring the beautiful city of Baltimore with fellow DEM folks.

Overall the conference was an awesome opportunity for Ally to network with other student employment professionals, learn about student employment best practices, hear from some incredible keynote speakers, and she looks forward to hopefully being able to attend again in the future. Ally is coming back to the office feeling energized and excited to implement some of these new ideas and practices into the RO student employee program.