2025 Virtual Sessions

All virtual sessions are free.

Search all virtual J-Term sessions by date and time on Engage

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The Pathway to Your Career Plan

Co-Curricular Advising and the Center for Career Engagement seek up to 100 students interested in learning how the skills they've acquired in classes, co-curricular experiences, summer jobs, and more are sought by today's employers. If you have used your creativity, problem solving, communication, teamwork, and analytical skills as a student at Gettysburg, we hope you'll join this session where we will explore how employers are looking for you. We will talk about reflection, narrow down possible career options, build on your existing experiences, and discuss future related experiential opportunities. We take a beginning look at career interests and review the tools you can use to go to the next step!

Here’s what you’ll learn:

• Students will better understand how to reflect on and articulate their transferrable skills
• Students will learn how to access the resources available to them through the Center for Career Engagement and Co-curricular Advising
• Students will leave the session with clearly articulated next steps in their experiential journey and career exploration

From Fear to Flourishing: Unlocking Your Public Speaking Potential

to help you transform anxiety into confidence and enhance your speaking abilities. In this interactive virtual session, you’ll learn proven techniques to manage stage fright, structure compelling presentations, and engage your audience with clarity and poise. Whether you’re new to public speaking or looking to refine your skills, this session will equip you with the tools needed to deliver powerful, authentic speeches that leave a lasting impact.

Participants will be able to:

• Reflect on and identify their fears about public speaking
• Build confidence in their strengths to design and deliver a clear and successful presentation
• Summarize and use a simple process to design and deliver an authentic and compelling presentation
• Apply tools and techniques related to stortelling, body language & non-verbals, and visual aids to maximize the impact of their speeches and presentations

Guided Pathways: "A Crash Course"

Are you a Guided Pathways student and are wondering, "What do I do next?" Did you meet with a Co-Curricular Advisor last year or this year, and still have questions about the Guided Pathways? Have you participated in any clubs, organizations, events, or career-related opportunitites and are wondering how to submit a reflection? Learn the answers to these questions and more as we provide a deep dive into the process!

Here’s what you’ll learn:

• Students will understand the purpose and structure of the Guided Pathways and the value of their co-curricular experiences
• Students will leave the session with clearly articulated next steps to completing a reflection
• Students will experience the process of having a co-curricular advising appointment

LinkedIn Learning: Customizing Your Learning Experience

Unlock the full potential of LinkedIn Learning by tailoring your educational journey to fit your unique needs and goals. This session will guide you through the essential steps for personalizing your learning experience, including how to create a customized learning path, select courses that align with your career objectives, and set actionable goals. Discover how to leverage LinkedIn Learning’s advanced features to track your progress, curate a list of relevant courses, and integrate learning into your daily routine. Whether you're aiming to acquire new skills, deepen existing knowledge, or achieve specific career milestones, this session provides the tools and strategies to make LinkedIn Learning work for you.

Participants will be able to:

• Develop a personalized learning path
• Identify and select relevant courses
• Utilize advanced features
• Integrate learning into your routine
• Meaure and reflect on your progress

Excel Like a Pro

While most Gettysburg students have previously used Microsoft Excel, many are only scratching the surface of its capabilities. In this session, you will learn how to get the very most out of the software and learn to use it like a true pro! Participants will explore intermediate-level features and tools in Excel that can help create, process, analyze, and calculate complex business data.

Here’s what you’ll learn:

• Recognize and create proper spreadsheet design.
• Understand spreadsheet formulas, pivot tables, graphics, smart art, and add-ins.
• Leverage Excel as a tool to convey and organize your information and data.

Storytelling: Helping People Care About Your Message

Getting your point across and helping people understand your arguments can be wickedly tough. That's why the basics of storytelling and narrative are so important. Join former National Park Service interpretive trainer John Rudy as he guides you through the basics of telling a story - from plot and narrative, to the tension-release cycle and building empathy. Make your writing and arguments stand out by feeding the oldest human impulse: storytelling.

At the end of this session, participants will:

• Explore classic forms of story structure that can help you create engaging narratives.
• Discover the importance of identifying your hero, their villain, & establishing clear stakes.
• Explore ways the core elements of storytelling can be applied to liberal arts environments.

Making the Most of the Gettysburg Network

Networking is an integral part of the career development journey, but can feel overwhelming, particularly when you don't know where to start. Join the Center for Career Engagement, together with young alumni volunteers, as we share how to take the best advantage of the Gettysburg Network. We will cover finding networking contacts, reaching out, and and how to have productive and meaningful conversations.

At the end of this session, participants will:

• Gain an understanding of the principles of professional networking and begin to identify ways to increase their social capital
• Interact with alumni, hear personal anecdotes, and gain networking advice from industry professionals in real time
• Students will learn how to develop new contacts within their field, strategies and techniques for networking, and begin to make a networking plan

A Crash Course in Thinking About and Applying to Law School

Why go to law school? If you want to go, how do you get there? These two questions will animate an interactive workshop with Gettysburg College's faculty pre-law advisor Scott Boddery and current Harvard Law student Ben Pontz ’20.

After sharing some high-level thoughts about reasons to go and not to go, Boddery and Pontz will delve into the nuts and bolts of how to develop a comprehensive and personalized application strategy driven to maximize a student's chances of achieving their goals. Boddery and Pontz will remain available to students after the session to discuss their individual aspirations and plans.

Here’s what you’ll learn:

• Articulate the pros and cons of going to law school and what is reasonable and unreasonable to expect while there.
• Gain the tools to distinguish law schools from one another and understand how to develop a balanced list of schools to apply to, leverage for scholarship opportunities, and ultimately matriculate.
• See and hear examples of application strategies that work and that do not work, from personal statements to engagement with law school admissions offices.

Be a Better Leader: Situational Leadership and Emotional Intelligence

Want to be a great leader? Focus on people over performance. Build relationships. Reduce conflict. Adapt in a crisis. And do it all in your own unique way. In this interactive session you’ll do exercises to unpack your personality and identify your own leadership style. You’ll learn to recognize and lean into emotions to improve performance. Whether you’re captain of the lacrosse team or president of your fraternity, learn how to use empathy and self-awareness to motivate people and get things done.

At the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Identify your personal leadership style.
• Understand and exercise situational leadership.
• Apply emotional intelligence as a leader.

Level Up Your Resume and Cover Letter

The Center for Career Engagement is seeking students who want to take their resume to the next level. Whether you've just started your resume, are transitioning from a high school resume to a professional one, have too many experiences or not enough, we want to hear from you at this session. We'll start with a resume overview, work together to evaluate effectiveness and edit experiences, and examine experience gaps. We will also review cover letters as they can show potential employers you're the right one for the job. Help your application documents be more impressive and effective, so you land that first interview and the next and the next...

At the end of this session, participants will be able to:

• Students will understand the individual purposes of the resume and cover letter.
• Students will have the tools to edit and update their documents as needed.
• Students will have an understanding of what to look for in job and internship advertisements and tailor their documents accordingly.

Rich Rewards: The Secrets to Becoming “Wealthy”

Successful long-term investing and wealth accumulation have little to do with intellect, but everything to do with behavior and developing sound financial habits. Regardless of occupation or earnings level, becoming wealthy is an achievable goal. Join us as nationally recognized Financial Advisor Kevin J. Smith ’89 discuss how college students are ideally positioned to become high-networth investors. Yet, being “wealthy” is about more than becoming rich. It entails a richness in life—finding purpose, pursuing passions, and appreciating all the things that money can’t buy.

Here’s what you’ll learn:

• Identify financial tools for successful long-term investing and wealth accumulation.
• Recognize being wealthy isn’t all about money.
• Implement the use of iGrad, a free financial tool at Gettysburg College.

Marketing Tactics for Student Entrepreneurs

Join us for a free 90-minute workshop on landing page creation and digital marketing. You will walk away with your own fully functional landing page and a good understanding of how marketing funnels and digital marketing works. We will also show you how to find and register the perfect .com domain for your business so you will be ready to launch a great-looking landing page (website) for your business. **BONUS: Whoever designs the best landing page gets a FREE 1-year .com domain registration**

Here’s what you’ll learn:

• Create your own fully functioning landing page.
• Find and register the perfect .com domain name for your business.
• Gain a greater understanding of marketing funnels and digital marketing.

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More information

For questions about January Term virtual sessions, please email jterm@gettysburg.edu.