Wesleyan provides a range of academic services to students in support of learning both inside and outside the classroom. The Writing Workshop and Math Workshop are important resources available to all students. Student Academic Resources (SAR) includes programs for intellectual enrichment and academic support. One key element of SAR is the work of Academic Peer Advisors (APAs). APAs are upperclass students who work during new student orientation and throughout the academic year to support Wesleyan’s faculty advising program, enhance student access to academic resources, and strengthen students’ academic skills. In addition, the Deans' Peer Tutoring program provides content-based tutoring services for most courses and is available to all students.

The goals of SAR are to foster a community culture that recognizes the relationship between intellectual growth and personal development; to ensure that students know about and are encouraged to seek out appropriate services; and to share information among programs and constituents to ensure the provision of high-quality and accessible services that facilitate academic achievement for all students. More information is available on the academic resources website.

Career Advising

Employers and graduate schools look for applicants who can write well, think critically, and solve problems independently. Because of their liberal arts training, Wesleyan students attain these skills in the context of a wider knowledge of human experiences. While students need not prepare narrowly for their careers, Wesleyan encourages them to give careful thought to their lives after graduation.

The Gordon Career Center works with students of all class years to:

• Translate their liberal education, and campus and community experiences, into a lifetime of meaningful work
• Explore their interests, personality, skills, and experiences to identify potential career options that fit their unique profile
• Write professional resumes, CVs, cover letters, and personal statements for job, internship, fellowship, and graduate/professional school applications
• Find meaningful summer opportunities to bolster and build professional skills and experiences related to their career aspirations
• Conduct successful job and internship searches, prepare and practice for interviews, and build strong relationships with employers and Wesleyan alumni
• Research and connect with professional schools, graduate schools, and degree programs; craft competitive applications; and navigate the school decision-making process
• Transition to life after Wesleyan, whether through employment, a fellowship, graduate or professional school, a service program, volunteer opportunity, or personal adventure

The Gordon Career Center uses an intuitive and modern career management platform, Handshake. This mobile-ready recruiting application is designed to help students discover and explore jobs, internships, organizations, and events all personalized to their specific career interests.

Health Professions and PreMedical Advising

Health professions graduate schools welcome students with a liberal arts background. A liberal arts education does not exclude the scientific and quantitative knowledge required to become an outstanding health professional; rather, it includes courses from these disciplines within a larger intellectual context.

Please note that health professional schools (medical, dental, veterinary medicine, nursing, optometry, etc.) do not require a specific major, readily accepting applicants from diverse academic backgrounds. However, they do require that applicants take specific courses (mostly in the sciences) in order to apply. Therefore, your choice of major should be based on a variety of factors—ideally your preferred area of study, and what you do well in, rather than what you think health professional schools want to see. As a health provider, you may want to work in a Spanish-speaking community; if so, a Hispanic Literature and Cultures or Latin American Studies major would be a great advantage. Perhaps you will want to prepare yourself for some of the tougher ethical questions that physicians face, and therefore choose Philosophy, Religion, or Science in Society as your major. An Economics major can help you when you confront the variety of market forces that affect health care practice and research. You should choose some of your courses with these types of considerations in mind, as well as giving yourself the opportunity to develop as a whole person, thereby taking courses for no other reason than the fact that they intrinsically appeal to you.

Students are encouraged to explore and test their interest in a given health profession through internships, summer employment, volunteer positions in a clinical setting, and shadowing health professionals before applying to graduate school. The Gordon Career Center and the Office of Community Service provide information about volunteer opportunities on campus and in the local community for students considering the health professions. Experience in conducting research may also be very useful in learning about a field and developing the skills needed to contribute to the field and to evaluate the work of others. Students with a particular interest in the natural sciences have the opportunity to participate in laboratory research projects under the supervision of Wesleyan faculty who are principal investigators with on-campus research groups that may also include graduate students. In recent years, undergraduates have also participated in public health and clinical research both on and off campus. Some student researchers have been coauthors of papers published in scientific journals or have presented the results of their research at scholarly meetings. Beginning with the first week of the first year and continuing beyond graduation, a specialized health professions advisor is available to assist students and graduates interested in any of the health professions with academic planning, identification of summer opportunities and meaningful post-graduation employment, and preparation for and navigation of the application process to health professions graduate schools. The Wesleyan Health Professions Panel offers current students and those within five years of graduation a letter of institutional sponsorship at the time of application to medical, dental, or veterinary school. The success of Wesleyan’s alumni in various health fields attests to the quality of our undergraduate curriculum and our health professions advising. For more information go to our health professions site. 

PreBusiness

Wesleyan alumni are sought after in the business world. A significant number of the organizations that recruit Wesleyan students are business concerns. Recent top employers have included Amazon, Bloomberg, BlackRock, Booz Allen Hamilton, Citi, Facebook, Google, IBM, JPMorgan Chase, and Venture for America. Wesleyan has a reputation among employers for producing students who have well-developed organizational and leadership skills. A Wesleyan student in almost any major who does well and plans his or her courses with an eye toward meeting entrance requirements for professional study will be well prepared for business school. It is rare for undergraduates to go directly to a top-tier business school without work experience. In fact, many of the top-tier business schools require two to four years of work experience for competitive candidates. Students interested in fields such as banking and consulting should plan to take quantitative courses offered by a number of academic departments to seek an internship in their field of interest as early as sophomore year.

PreLaw

Law schools have long recognized that liberal arts institutions provide the best possible preparation for future attorneys. They look for students who possess particular intellectual skills: the ability to think critically, analyze a situation, extract pertinent information, and communicate effectively, both orally and in writing. Any academic major is acceptable to a law school. Wesleyan students who major in the traditionally popular subjects of study for prelaw: History, Government, Economics, English, American Studies, and Philosophy; and now the less traditional, in the sciences and the arts; are admitted each year to the top law schools in the country. Outside the classroom, Wesleyan students participate in a variety of activities that develop the character and leadership skills they will need to succeed in law school, including political and social activism and community service. Over the summer, students intern at such organizations as the Northern Virginia Capital Defender Office, the Bronx Defenders Office, the Center for Court Innovation, Ungvarsky Law LLC (a capital defense firm), and the CT Commission on Human Rights and Opportunities. The Gordon Career Center has a designated prelaw advisor who provides resources and information for students considering careers in and related to law. Students and graduates are encouraged to meet with the advisor individually, attend informational workshops and guest speaker events (e.g., human rights law, careers in law and policy, careers in “Big Law”), and seek faculty assistance to navigate the law school selection and application process.