The AAGE being their usual helpful selves released the 2011 Careers Fair Schedule last week. This is only my 3rd year on the Grad recruitment campaign trail coming up but so far each year has brought different formats in terms of the schedule the fairs are held within.
The 2011 Careers Fair Schedule
The easiest way to list out the schedule is chronologically grouped by state so here we go: Victoria
- Monday 7th March The Big Meet Melbourne
- Tuesday 8th March Victoria University
- Wednesday 9th March University of Melbourne
- Thursday 10th March RMIT
- Tuesday 15th March La Trobe University
- Wednesday 16th March Swinburne University
- Thursday 17th March Monash University
- Friday 18th March Ballarat
- Monday 21st March Deakin University
NSW
- 3rd March Macquarie University
- Friday 11th March The Big Meet Sydney
- Monday 14th March University of Sydney
- Friday 8th April Unviersity of Wollongong
- Monday 11th April UTS
- Tuesday 12th April UWS (Engineering & IT)
- Wednesday 13th April UNSW
- Friday 15th April UWS
- Monday 18th April Newcastle
South Australia
- Tuesday 22nd March Uni SA
- Wednesday 23rd March Flinders University (Science, Engineering)
- Wednesday 23rd March Uni of Adelaide (Business & Arts)
- Thursday 24th March Flinders University (Law)
- Thursday 24th March Uni of Adelaide (Science & IT)
Western Australia
- Tuesday 22nd March The Big Meet Perth
- Wednesday 23rd March Curtin University
- Thursday 7th April Murdoch University
Queensland
- Tuesday 22nd March Central Queensland University
- Thursday 24th March Sunshine Coast
- Friday 25th March University of Southern Queensland
- Monday 28th March QUT
- Tuesday 29th March Griffith (Nathan Campus)
- Wednesday 30th March Univeristy of Queensland
- Thursday 31st March Griffith (Gold Coast)
- Thursday 31st March Bond University
- Tuesday 5th April James Cook University (Townsville)
- Wednesday 6th April James Cook University (Cairns)
- Northern Territory
- Wednesday 30th March Charles Darwin University
Tasmania
- Friday 11th March University of Tasmania
ACT
- Friday 25th March Tertiary to Work(ANU, UC, ACU)
Links to the downloadable PDF versions of the careers fair timetable can be found on the AAGE site here: http://www.aage.com.au/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=63&Itemid=71
Major Changes
Length of the Season The biggest change to the schedule that you can see is the length of the season which is around 2 weeks longer than it was this year in 2010 with the last careers fair finishing on the 18th of April. This is going to mean a very long travelling period for employers who do go to the majority of these events or else the alternative which is to cut back on the numbers of fairs attended to avoid 6 7 weeks out of the office and on the road. From reviewing the application close dates from a number of our client campaigns this year, many employers will have closed their application period before 5 of the larger NSW universities have even held their careers fairs. It is worth noting that all of the AAGE organised Big Meet fairs fall in March which may help to get in front of some of the graduates you may not be able to see due to the late dates of other NSW universities specifically. NSW Fair Timeline Spread NSW fairs start on the 3rd of March with Macquarie University, then the next NSW fairs are held in Mid March with The Big Meet Sydney & University of Sydney. The next NSW fairs are between the 8th and 18th of April. This makes attending the NSW based fairs a close to 7 week exercise so it will be interesting to see how this impacts in terms of employer attendances. Easter Easter is a lot later on in the year for 2011 compared to 2010 which was very early in April. In 2011 it is very late in April. We have noticed that the Easter break is a major trigger of job hunting activity for graduates in Australia due to a large academic workload in the run up to the Uni Easter Break. It may be worth taking this into account if you are able to have any flexibility around your application opening dates to be able to receive applications at that time of the year.
The Verdict
All in all, this is the 3rd schedule that I've seen in my 3 seasons in the industry so far and each year the schedule has been vastly different than the last. The AAGE report on careers fair attendances has recently been released and it is interesting to see that overall, more organisations are attending these fairs, however attendances as a whole were lower in 2010 compared to 2009 so this longer schedule for 2011 will change these numbers again I think and we'll be keeping a close eye on the next report to see how this scheduling format has impacted attendances by employers.