Feature

North South University is the first university that established a specific department of Career and Professional Services(CPDS) to provide a multifaceted support system for the students career. Department of Career Services (DCS) and Professional Development Programme (PDP) merged together to form (CPDS) - providing complete solution to internships, career counseling, job placement and professional development of the faculties and administrative staffs of NSU.

CPDS has been fully active, steadfast in fulfilling its overriding objectives like organising seminars, symposium, training programmes, conferences thus making a significant contribution to the career management of NSU students by arranging their internships, job training placement, and career counseling, and side by side also catering to the professional development of the faculty members and staff of the university. The department co-ordinates its activities with all the academic programmes and disciplines and the alumni associations of the university. It also maintains active communication with external agencies, organisations and institutions.

Shahnaz Islam, Job Counselor of CPDS says, "At present the job market is shrinking compared to the number of growing qualified candidates, hence it becomes very difficult to get the work done. But a candidate who has a good academic profile having a moderately high CGPA, confident presentation skills, adept communication tactics, a good command on language - can easily grab a jackpot in job market. Creativity is another important factor in today's job arena because many employers now want their employees to think "out of the box" . NSU students are well taught about the core subject matters, and through successive practice , project works and reports our students gain a practical idea on working professionally with organisations, we prepare them accordingly. To compete in today's marketplace, the organisations need the kind of employee who are "a complete package" , at CPDS, we help the organisations fulfill this need. And I would say one of our greatest achievements is that at present, we have the option for international internship at AC Nielsen(USA) and Johnson Control (Singapore)."

Every year, CPDS hosts a job fair where it invites both national and multi naitonal companies for onsite recruitment and internship. At present the director of CPDS is Dr. Abdul Hannan Chowdhury. Approximately,140 students obtain internship placement through CPDS each semester . Department of CPDS is dedicated to bringing together the employers, students and alumni-assisting employers to find the best prepared and the most qualified candidates for respective jobs. The core functions of the department includes : organising job fair ,career planning and counseling services, resume writing workshops for students, job listing and identification, international opportunities for job placement, and professional development of the faculties and staff. CDPS organised almost 20 programmes in 2006.

The meeting, which continued for three hours, was moderated by Hassan A. Keynan, Programme Specialist (Education), UNESCO, Dhaka. Shahnoor Wahid, Senior Assistant Editor of the Daily Star, Samar Roy, Director of the Media Professionals Group, and Abdur Rafique, National Programme Officer, UNESCO, Dhaka spoke on
the occasion. Umme Oara presented the keynote paper.

(Assistant Professor, Law Department, Dhaka University)