Omicron Delta Kappa (ODK) is an honor society that has been present on MTU campus for several years. However, the leadership of ODK, including its’ president and members of the executive board, are all new and looking for fresh and innovative ways to inspire leadership on-campus. While Leadership Week isn’t new, it has been an ODK tradition for many years; the ideas and motivation for the events included a fresh take on what kind of activities will spark leadership in students.
“Last year Leadership Week was a couple of lectures,” says Tim Hammond, ODK’s new president. “We’re trying to incorporate new ideas and increase [Leadership Week’s] presence on-campus where it’s a yearly event that people know about. We want it to be like events such as Stand-a-thon where people know about it every year.” One way the ODK members planned on doing that was by making the events interactive and increasing the diversity of the events themselves.
“ODK has five main areas,” says Hammond, “Creative and Performing Arts, Service, Scholarship, Athletics, and Speech and Media so we catered the events to these five things.” Each of the days had a theme and the events reflected one of the five areas.
Students enjoyed an interactive workshop on Monday, reflecting the importance of Creative and Performing Arts, from Dr. Held, Chair of Creative and Performing Arts.
On Tuesday, attendees of the “Campus Connections to Leadership!” Head from Jess Turuc, Assistant Director of Student Activities for Greek Life and Leadership, who highlighted many groups and organizations on-campus that students can join to become more active. On Wednesday, the cats and dogs at the Copper Country Humane Society enjoyed a visit and a walk or a pet from the ODK future-leaders to explore the Service aspect of leadership. Also on Wednesday, speaker Terry Beam, a professional from “Motor City Connect” detailed the importance of networking to students looking for a fulfilling career in “Networking to Your Next Job Now!” The final day, Thursday, is devoted to the area of Athletics and ODK collaborated with OAP (another aspect of leadership!) to bring a challenge course to DHH for students looking to take a break from studies and challenge their leadership abilities.
ODK members are contacted based on high GPA marks through letter sent out when they reach Junior/Senior status. The Honor Society then works to promote leadership on-campus and help their members network for jobs after college. Sometimes, admits Hammond, students join “because it looks good on a resume” but “just joining isn’t enough to make you a leader,” reminds Hammond. “We are working on building an internal structure for our members to work on their leadership skills.”
One of the ways to do that: collaborate with other leadership opportunities on-campus. One of the hallmarks of the organization that sets ODK apart is their collaborative approach to building events like Leadership Week. Many of the events were sponsored or organized with another campus organization such as Career Services, Creative and Performing Arts Department, and the Outdoor Adventure Program.
The next step for ODK involves setting up a forum for discussing student issues on-campus. “If there’s something you want to see change or a voice that you think needs to be heard—Join in!” says Hammond. “We can talk about it and try to find a solution together.” Look for more on this later, since right now ODK is ready to enjoy the after-glow of their Leadership Week
If you are interested in ODK or Leadership Week events please contact Tim Hammond at tghammon@mtu.edu

This week, Michigan Tech Career Services gets ready to present their Spring schedule of events. The line-up of resume reviewing, professional interviewing, and career-fair-corporation-scheduling should present Michigan Tech students with plenty of opportunities to land that enticing, yet elusive job offer. Whether you’re looking for an internship, co-op, or the big one—a job, Career Services recommends looking into what employers see when they look at you. Director of Career Services, Jim Turnquist, gives his insight into the current job climate, Career Services opportunities that can improve your chances, and how people are finding jobs today.
The U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2008-2009 Report on National Employment shows that changes, if any, to the present climate are going to be slow. Household Survey Data shows that the unemployment rate is 10 percent and the number of unemployed people surveyed, 15.3 million Americans, hasn’t changed in December 2009 from December 2008 and is only a minor change from the number of unemployed Americans at the start of the recession in December 2007. What does this mean at Michigan Tech?
“I make an effort to watch several feeders [on the job climate] and I think the present job climate is improving, but doing so very slowly. Here at Michigan Tech we are very fortunate to be one of those institutes that people come to us to find employees and it’s a new phenomena for students to not have that as much as we have had in the past.” Mr. Turnquist says, “But there are jobs out there for people, if students do put in the effort to do a job search, to work on a resume, practice interviewing, and contact companies, people find jobs.”
“One of the critical issues, I think, for Michigan Tech is developing personal skills. Recessions like these change what employers want from employees, companies start downsizing personnel and they want people who can do more than one type of job. For example, if you’re an Electrical Engineer, that’s great, but do you have the people skills? Or if you’re a Humanities major with knowledge of technology, that’s going to make you more competitive” says Turnquist.
His advice: take more courses outside of your field of study, and then follow that up by developing a plan, which is what he and the staff of Career Services can help with. Their typical approach includes having students fill out a “My Plan” document that profiles personality, skills, interests, and values. Students’ specialized profiles will accrue a list of potential careers that a student can then develop as a goal and setout for your bachelor’s degree with a plan for attaining a job in a career that truly interests them. “If you put a plan together your chances are a lot higher than just going to talk to a few companies at the job fair” says Turnquist.
The Michigan Tech undergraduate program in the 2008-2009 Career Services Annual Report experienced a job placement of 56.2 percent of graduates in their field of study, 25.8 percent going on to graduate school, 2.7 percent continued with additional undergraduate studies, .7percent are performing volunteer work and 2 percent entering the military. 12.5 percent reported they were unemployed.
Placement percentages are based on people that provided information. All graduates were contacted either by email, departmental personnel, web site or by telephone.
The MTU Career Fair is sponsored by Michigan Tech Career Services and Alpha Kappa Psi.

Three judges met in Ballroom A of the Memorial Union Building on September 16 to evaluate the performances of a number of individuals.
No, it wasn’t “American Idol,” but the Wednesday event was meant to be seen as a “takeoff” of the popular show, according to MTU Career Services Director Jim Turnquist. The event, titled “Interview Idol,” was designed to provide students with some idea of how to handle themselves in an interview for a job, internship, or co-op. While Career Services has put on interview events every year, last year they decided they wanted to “add a little color,” said Turnquist. Thus, last year saw the first-ever Interview Idol. That time, Turnquist explained, it “was a lot of trial and error” and they were “hoping [it would] be a little more polished this time.”
To represent the American Idol judges, Career Services drew from the Michigan Tech staff for people who could act like the judges, or at least the stereotypes of them. Vice President of Student Affairs Les Cook portrayed the ever-critical Simon Cowell, Dean of Students Gloria Melton represented the cliché-loving Paula Abdul, and men’s basketball coach Kevin Luke stood in for Randy Jackson. Caterpillar representatives from the class of 2006 served as the host and the interviewers. And finally, current students acted out the roles of hopefuls being interviewed.
Four interviews were played out, and covered “the good, the bad, and the ugly of interviews” as Turnquist put it. In one interview, the prospective employee arrived well-dressed, spoke confidently and stayed on-topic with any question asked of her. In another, the person being interviewed arrived in sweatpants and a T-shirt, failed to answer the questions asked of him, and made overbroad generalizations without giving any support for them. Between interviews, the host and judges would discuss and explain what the person did right or did wrong, and display helpful tips for the audience to keep in mind during a real job interview. Following the final interview, the host gave information about the different programs that Career Services offers, and a drawing was held to distribute prizes donated by MTU’s corporate partners.

At Michigan Tech, there is an enormous amount of student organizations that provide a vibrant variety of activities and services to the entire student body. Memorial Union Building (MUB) room 106, the Student Organizations Office, currently houses 13 organizations that operate advantageous functions such as Blue Key, The Lode, Sound and Lighting Services and more. The office provides cubicle workspaces, mailboxes, copy and fax machines and a reception desk.

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