INDEPENDENT GRADUATE: CAREER CALENDER

July/August

l Final-year students should start making decisions about postgraduate study options (ask your careers service for details). Particularly helpful websites are www. postgrad.hobsons.com and www. prospects. csu.ac.uk, which will give you relevant occupational information, surveys of vocational courses and a postgraduate directory.

l Peruse employer directories either in your local library or the careers service office of your university. GET, for instance, contains details of thousands of employers, large and small, with opportunities both overseas and within the UK. It will tell you all you need to know about what sort of jobs are on offer, along with location, training, salaries, and when and how to apply. Many careers services have also set up their own websites designed to give you access to useful employer sites and search engines.

September

Graduate Teacher Training Registry opens. This is the time to apply for Postgraduate Certificate of Education courses if you are interested in becoming a qualified teacher.

Recruitment for training contracts for solicitors begins.

First closing date for Civil Service "fast-stream" administrative appointments, including the European Fast Stream, leading to a Brussels-based career.

Start visiting employers' web sites. They can be a lot more fun and informative than their brochures, and you can often submit your application on-line. But be sure not to become lazy when it comes to filling it in. The Internet can tempt users to be spontaneous rather than carefully preparing, a definite no-no for graduates, as competition is increasingly tough.

October

It's time for those careers information fairs. For further details, contact careers services and AIESEC.

Watch out for the influx of recruitment brochures and projected vacancies for next autumn. Either send off for them or visit the careers services office.

Careers services will have arranged talks by invited speakers and careers seminars to take you through the rest of term.

For students entering industries where sponsorship is relevant, start applying now.

Watch out for "skills events" organised by some students unions.

Think about joining the Industrial Society and/or AIESEC. These are the two student societies most in touch with employers.

Some firms (such as Mars and Procter & Gamble) have closing dates for 1999 recruitment.

Visit the AGCAS Scottish Graduate Fair in Glasgow, 20 & 21 October.

November

Employers start giving presentations. Time to start completing their applications forms.

Corporate banks and advertising agencies begin recruiting.

Chartered accountants start their recruitment tours of campuses.

Make sure you've applied for postgraduate taught courses (MSc or diploma) beginning in the autumn.

Summer vacation recruits will begin to be sought out by some firms.

December

Don't miss the Christmas vacation courses run by some firms: they can lead to immediate job offers.

Ask your careers service for dates of seminars on perfecting your application forms and CV.

Start picking up copies of New Scientist if you're interested in laboratories' recruitment campaigns.

The second closing date for "fast-stream" appointments in the Civil Service.

Visit the AGCAS Graduate Fair at the Business Design Centre, London (30 June and 1 July).

January

The milk round commences: first interviews by industrial and commercial employers on campus.

Time to apply for PhD studies.

Students interested in law should watch out for legal firms that are seeking undergraduates for summer placements.

Seek suggestions on impressing at interviews. Careers services will advise. Also see GET99 magazine.

February

Second interviews at many firms commence.

Expect to see some excited faces: job offers begin on a big scale.

The particularly excited faces may give some clues as to who is being headhunted by employers. This is a new trend among graduates, but one that is on the increase.

March

More job offers.

"Insight into Management" courses run by some careers services.

If you are interested in a career in the media, consider applying to do some work experience during the Easter holidays.

April

Look out for those employers that have Easter vacation courses.

May

You can't afford to miss regular visits to the careers service bulletin boards: job vacancies should now be advertised weekly.

June

Summer fairs commence. Recruitment events are particularly worthwhile at the universities of Bristol, Brunel, Cardiff, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Leeds, Liverpool, London, Manchester, Newcastle, Nottingham, Reading and Ulster.

Don't miss out on the mini-milk rounds.

July

If you haven't got a job offer yet, don't panic. An ever-increasing number of graduates don't even have time to start thinking seriously about jobs until they've got their studies out of the way.

Ensure you keep up with careers service vacancy lists, specialist journals and newspaper advertisements. It's important that you remember to look at local papers (including the freebies). These have become more relevant in recent years as companies decentralise and begin to recruit locally.

Start to make speculative applications to employers who might be interested.

Chartered accountants commence recruitment for the next year.