Peer Mentoring

The Covid-19 pandemic has brought many vulnerable groups, including students, to the foreground. Many students in Freiburg, who relied on mini-jobs have lost their regular source of income. Especially affected are the internationals. To add to the issue, it is anticipated that after the pandemic, the number of jobs will be limited. Warranting fierce competition in the job market students will have to prepare themselves for the upcoming challenges in a smart and ingenious ways.

 

On a different note, the problem of tailoring the documents according to the industrial needs has probably been ever-existent; even before the pandemic, often students feel disconnected from the industry. The university also provides invaluable career guidance advice, however, they mostly cover the general aspects of the profile and lack the technical as well as the networking touch. The lack of information exchange channels between the industry and the academics has left the gap for a reliable, genuine/authentic and affordable information exchange medium, where students can consult experts/ seniors to work on their professional profiles already during their academics.

The Global Shapers Freiburg Hub proposes a peer-2-peer mentoring service for the student community. The aim is to allow students to leverage the experience and knowledge of their seniors who are already working in their professional careers. The platform is envisioned to facilitate interaction between the academic and professional worlds. An ideal scenario would be where a student can get valuable insights from alumni working in his/her domain of interest and make informed decisions with regard to his/her future study course of action. The platform also promotes mentorship relations between the students and the alumni to help students in building their professional profiles including guidance on professional documents.

Moreover, the concept identifies that a large number of employment opportunities are filled by leveraging of ones network. Therefore the platform envisions promotion of networking groups to facilitate employment opportunities for newly graduate and as well as pursuing students.