A Mentor’s Take: Kicking Off Year 9 at Beacon Hills!

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On Thursday, September 18th, 2025 was the launch of my ninth year as a mentor with the Academy. The Academy Mentor  Info Session & Happy Hour was at Beacon Hillsin Aksarben.  Even as a veteran, I always find immense value in these gatherings.

Still Learning After All These Years

The Info Session (3:30–4:00 p.m.) was incredibly useful A folder of information was provided to talk about the benefits of being a mentor and what the program was about.

The Best Part of the Kickoff

But, let’s be honest, the true highlight for the veterans like me is the Happy Hour (4:00–5:00 p.m.). It was nice to be off campus and be provided food and drinks.

Ready for Year Nine

The next step is waiting for my mentee to contact me so we can kick off the 2025-2026 year.

HackUNO is a 24 hour competition in which teams of 1-3 students work together to create software and hardware projects. At the end of the 24 hours, the projects are judged by various criteria, including our theme. This year, our theme is weather. We hope to bring together students from all over the Midwest to compete, build awesome projects, and network with each other and companies.

I helped sponsor the meeting

On Friday, October 16, 2020 from 9:00 AM to 11:30 AM I was a judge for the First Round of the University of Nebraska – Omaha Capstone Cup. The Capstone Cup is a strategy competition for Senior Level students that Farm Credit Services of America is a sponsor of the 2020 / 2021 school year.

I was a judge on 3 rounds of students presenting a strategic plan to the board of the directors of a company. For being virtually the students did a great job presenting. The students were graded on a 10 point system on problem formulation, analysis, recommendation and presentation.

The Spring 2021 UNO CBA career was held on March 3rd 2021 from 12:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m.

Feedback from the virtual session my team facilitated during the fair.

On Friday, March 26, 2021 from 8am – 4pm. I participated in the UNO Thompson Learning Center speed Interviews. This was open to Employer & Community Partners.  this event, has nearly 280 Thompson Learning Community (TLC) sophomore students will practice their interviewing skills and connect with employers.

TLC students consist of all majors. Practice interviews will be formatted in 10 minute bursts with 5 minutes of feedback. In one hour, you may get connected with up to four students.

I was assigned a breakout room. That is when the practice interview begins.  Each student did a practice interviews of about 15 minutes in duration. The first 10 minutes will be you asking the student interview questions followed by the last 5 minutes to provide constructive feedback.  The feedback is to instill confidence yet provide candid feedback for growth.

On March 4th 2021 I attended the UNO CBA Scholars development panel along with these other companies such as Fiserv, Farm Credit Services of America, Northwestern Mutual.

After a short introduction on what my role was at FCSA. I was placed in virtual breakout rooms where students could ask questions.

The 2021 Spring UNO All Majors Career Fair was held on  February 17, 2021 from 11 A.M. – 3 P.M. CST | Virtua. it was hosted by the Academic & Career Development Center (ACDC), this fair will connect employers to students from all colleges and majors. 

On Monday, January 25 from 10am to Noon I attended the UNO’s College of Business Administration (CBA) focus group meeting. This meeting was to evaluate the needs your ideas and perspectives CBA Employer Partners.

Through out the focus groups questions were asked. By participate in this strategic planning process. The results of these focus group meetings will guide CBA leadership as we build on our strengths and prioritize our strategic initiatives.

The 2020 FALL UNO : All Majors Career & Internship Fair (Virtual October Fair) was held on Thursday, October 8th 2020, 1:00 pm – 5:00 pm CDT.

This was the second virtual career fair the UNO Ambassadors attended.

Prework

The ambassadors reached out to the 2021 Business Technology Internship Leaders to a have a group session.

Reached out to Professors and student groups. We asked to email members and know we are doing internships.

Reached out to past students and anyone who rsvp on handshake. This was using past email from the 2020 Spring Career Fair.

Posted on Social Networks

Day of the Fair

1 on 1 Sessions

1 on 1 Sessions are scheduled in handshake by students.  1 on 1 sessions 10 minutes to have a conversation. I felt these sessions went faster than if we were chatting in person. I encouraged each to look at all company and find their passion.

Three pieces of advice to each student

• Talking about self-awareness
• Community involvement
• Social media presence.

Here are links I shared.

https://www.fcsamerica.com/careers

https://careers.peopleclick.com/careerscp/client_fcsam/external/jobDetails/jobDetail.html?jobPostId=2167&localeCode=en-us

www.meetup.com

I let each student know if I can help them in any way I will.

The Future Works Here 2020 (1 of 2) 30 minute session

Started with FCSAmerica introductions

Asked students to introduce

Joni talked who is FCSAmerica is?

Shelly talked about 2021 Team

· 8 team members

· 4 on software and 4 on Data Centric

· Desire to learn

· Collaboration

· Relationships

Questions:

What Technology will be used?

• Microsoft
• Front End
• Typescript, java script, css, html
• Database
• SQl Server
• Data Team
• Cloud Base in Azure
• Boomi

What we are looking for?

The Future Works Here 2020 (2 of 2) 30-minute session

We didn’t have anyone show up but the Director of CBA Laura s. did show up. She talked about how overwhelmed students are right now. Talked about how all employers are seeing different trends of engagement. Some are targeting students in handshake to giving employment opportunities in the newsletter.