{"id":39808,"date":"2016-04-13T18:34:49","date_gmt":"2016-04-13T23:34:49","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/?p=39808"},"modified":"2016-04-13T18:34:49","modified_gmt":"2016-04-13T23:34:49","slug":"need-a-job-uic-senior-turns-rejection-into-a-startup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/need-a-job-uic-senior-turns-rejection-into-a-startup\/","title":{"rendered":"Need a job? UIC senior turns rejection into a startup"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><strong> By Hannah Gebresilassie<\/strong><\/p>\n<p>Rejection was the inspiration behind a new startup.<\/p>\n<p>After getting turned down by over 50 employers, Thomas Ma had enough and created\u00a0<a href=\"http:\/\/mtt2800.wix.com\/careerpodium\">Career Podium<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/careerpodium\">Career Podium<\/a> is an interactive platform designed to help students successfully land internships and jobs. Ma, 22, is a senior at the University of Illinois at Chicago \u00a0set to graduate in May 2016.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;I was turned down so many times and started to feel bad about myself,&#8221; Ma says. &#8220;So, I don&#8217;t want students to go through that process.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p><!--more--><\/p>\n<p>[vimeo 162752885 w=474]<\/p>\n<div class=\"featurecaption\">Thomas Ma, founder of Career Podium, shares his experiences of applying for jobs and getting turned down over 50 times. (Hannah Gebresilassie\/MEDILL)<\/div>\n<div class=\"featurecaption\"><\/div>\n<p>&#8220;If students are involved on campus and engaged, they make better employees,&#8221; says Savannah Hill, IGS Energy recruiter and branch coordinator.<\/p>\n<p>UIC \u00a0celebrates its<a href=\"http:\/\/studentemployment.uic.edu\/NSEW.shtml\"> twenty-third <\/a>National Student Employment Week by providing resources for career development and recognizing student workers.<\/p>\n<div class=\"featurecaption\">Photo at top: Informational sheets on finding a job sit readily available for students during National Student Employment Week at UIC. (Hannah Gebresilassie\/MEDILL)<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>By Hannah Gebresilassie Rejection was the inspiration behind a new startup. After getting turned down by over 50 employers, Thomas Ma had enough and created\u00a0Career Podium. Career Podium is an interactive platform designed to help students successfully land internships and jobs. Ma, 22, is a senior at the University of Illinois at Chicago \u00a0set to [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":226,"featured_media":39826,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[585],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-39808","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-winter-2016"],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO plugin v26.6 - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>Need a job? UIC senior turns rejection into a startup - Medill Reports Chicago<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/news.medill.northwestern.edu\/chicago\/need-a-job-uic-senior-turns-rejection-into-a-startup\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Need a job? UIC senior turns rejection into a startup - Medill Reports Chicago\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"By Hannah Gebresilassie Rejection was the inspiration behind a new startup. After getting turned down by over 50 employers, Thomas Ma had enough and created\u00a0Career Podium. Career Podium is an interactive platform designed to help students successfully land internships and jobs. 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