Students at the University of Michigan are attending their annual Green Job Fair. January 22nd, 2019. Photo credit: Dave Brenner
Career fairs are advertised as an opportunity for students to connect with employers and secure job offers. Every semester, KSU fulfills its duty by hosting career fairs for students, promising to open doors for their futures.
Although a KSU survey showed that 97% of recruiters had a positive experience at the fairs in 2025, that number doesn’t reflect the reality of many students who attend these career fairs.
The structure of these career fairs tends to favor quantity over quality.
Students show up in numbers, all trying to compete for the attention of limited recruiters. This often leads to surface-level conversations, where students rarely get a meaningful follow-up.
By the end of the day, most students have built a collection of free pens, flyers and business cards but still no job offers.
KSU’s career fairs also tend to lack relevance.
Many companies that attend the career fairs recruit for roles that don’t align with students’ specific major or goals. For instance, many students in creative fields such as marketing, communication and the arts, often find themselves surrounded by employers primarily offering sales.
When asked how students feel about the success rate of KSU’s career fairs, there was one common response: they’re not worth the time.
“The career fairs aren’t worth it, especially when it’s major related,” said Mikhail Chery. “As a Design Animation major, there are not many job opportunities at these fairs.”
As an institution, KSU should be more inclusive when inviting companies to the career fairs. This way, students feel more confident about their professional success.
On many occasions, companies showed up to the career fairs and politely accepted resumes that they never revisited.
Students spend time to prepare for these fairs, polishing up their resumes and profiles only to get ghosted by the companies that show up.
“I don’t think the career fairs are useful at all. They’re never actually hiring,” said Solange Aniekwu, a Marketing major.
For many, it seems as though companies show up to help students network, and while networking is valuable, it is disheartening for students to invest time polishing resumes and elevator pitches only to be met with silence afterward.
Finally, assigning career fair attendance as a class requirement has made participation feel obligatory rather than purposeful. Many students who have attended the career fairs have done so simply for a grade.
While assigning the career fairs as a grade seems like a good way to get students engaged, it is doing the opposite. Students should want to attend career fairs for their own benefit and not because it is required of them.
KSU’s career fairs might look good on paper, but to many students, it feels performative.
Until the fairs become more intentional, relevant and beneficial, they will remain more of a checkbox event rather than a steppingstone for professional success.
