The Journal of Academic Librarianship 45 (2019) 358–367
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Undergraduate students' experiences of using information at the career fair:
A phenomenographic study conducted by the libraries and career center
T
Ilana Stonebraker , Clarence Maybee, Jessica Chapman
⁎
Purdue University, United States of America
ABSTRACT
Information literacy is vital to students seeking employment following their undergraduate education. Yet little is known about how students approach using
information as part of their career search. This phenomenographic study examined how students experience using information as part of a career fair, or on-campus
job expo. Researchers interviewed undergraduate students after a major campus career fair. The findings suggest that students may experience using information in a
career fair context as: 1) navigators completing a series of steps, 2) performers seeking to connect with the right person, or 3) aligners determining if a company is a
match for them.
Introduction
Literature review
Career fairs, also referred to as job fairs or career expos, are events
where companies send recruiters to showcase their firm to potential
employees. Job seekers strive to make a good impression to potential
employers by speaking face-to-face, asking questions, and filling out
applications. On college campuses, career fairs are often targeted at
entry level positions. Most large universities host at least one, and
sometimes several career fairs annually. Purdue hosts over 30 career
fairs each year (“Purdue CCO - Employers: Career Fairs,” n.d.). These
career fairs may be focused on a single population (such as international students) or a disciplinary or professional area (such as The
School of Management Employers Forum).
Career fairs are very important to students because they provide
opportunities to secure highly sought after internships as well as permanent employment. Searching for a job is a complex task that typically
involves a variety of activities, which include using informal and formal
information sources (Saks, 2006). This research investigates student
experiences of using information to prepare for and participate in a
career fair. The findings suggest that students may experience using
information in the career fair context as: 1) navigators completing a
series of steps, 2) performers seeking to connect with the right person,
or 3) aligners determining if a company is a match for them. The
findings suggest new pedagogic strategies for expanding student
awareness of aspects of using information to support their goals related
to career fair participation.
Career fairs are very important to universities as they may lead to
increases in the number of students employed after graduation, which
may affect university rankings. With an ever-increasing number of
educational options, potential students are increasingly more interested
placement rates as well. In addition, career fairs reinforce university
relationships with alumni. Employers value career fairs because they
strengthen their relationship with the university and provide access to a
pool of potential new employees. Research has shown students are
greatly impacted by personal interactions with companies, and the
companies that they interact with at a career fair are most likely going
to be the companies to which the students choose to apply (Sciarini &
Woods, 1997).
Given the role that information plays in the job search (Saks, 2006),
academic libraries may find opportunities to support students, the institution, and employers by working to bolster students' ability to use
information effectively. To meet the needs of students preparing for and
participating in a career fair, libraries may partner with their campus
career center. Librarians at Purdue University have worked with eight
career units to create a tailored resource for career information (Dugan,
Bergstrom, & Doan, 2009; Hollister, 2005). In addition, as part of a
campus collaboration, libraries have further developed educational
resources beyond single portals as part of successful career center collaborations (Howard, 2017; Pun, 2017; Sheley, 2014). At University of
Buffalo Libraries, collaborations with campus career centers have re-
⁎
Corresponding author.
E-mail address: stonebraker@purdue.edu (I. Stonebraker).
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.acalib.2019.05.002
Received 29 January 2019; Received in revised form 3 May 2019; Accepted 3 May 2019
Available online 14 May 2019
0099-1333/ © 2019 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
The Journal of Academic Librarianship 45 (2019) 358–367
I. Stonebraker, et al.
sulted in ongoing efforts to improve library collections, services, facilities, and web presence (Hollister, 2005).
in higher education experience information literacy. Understanding
learners varied experiences can enable teachers to design instruction
aimed at helping learners to experience the phenomenon being studied
in the classroom in new and more complex ways (Marton & Tsui, 2004).
Experiences of the career fair
Building on past efforts, further development of educational resources by academic libraries to support students' job searches can be
informed by better understanding the first-hand experiences of students
as they prepare and participate in career fairs. To date there have only
been a small number of studies that have examined students' perceptions of career fairs. Such studies have primarily focused on students'
perceptions of the usefulness of attending a career fair, or satisfaction
related to attending one. For example, Roehing and Cavanaugh (2000)
surveyed students about their perceptions of interactions with recruiters at career fairs, determining that students appreciate recruiters
who dressed professionally, show genuine interest in them, and have
brochures and other handouts to take away. Payne and Sumter (2005)
administered a survey to determine what students liked and felt they
gained from participation in a career fair. The findings suggest that
students felt that the career fair exposed them to information about
careers, provided information about the hiring process, and enabled
them to make internship or future career contacts.
A study of students who attended a career fair with hospitality industry employers found that the top three reasons students attend the
fair are: 1) networking, 2) learning about companies in the field, and 3)
the potential for arranging internships or interviews for permanent
positions (Silkes, Adler, & Phillips, 2010). Developing a survey from the
research conducted by Roehing and Cavanaugh (2000) and Payne and
Sumter (2005), Milman and Whitney (2014) also studied students who
attended a career fair for the hospitality industry. However, in this case
the study focused on factors associated with students' satisfaction of the
fair. The findings indicate that students' perception that the fair had
enough industry representatives from their specific areas of interest and
that the companies in those areas had open positions available supported their feelings of satisfaction. Satisfaction was also associated
with perceptions of whether or not a recruiter's actions indicated an
interest in them, such as taking their resume.
The current literature focuses on larger perspectives of job searching
(such as job fit) or narrowly focused on career fair satisfaction in order
to show success of a given career fair. Yet given how important it is for
undergraduate students to find their first job, knowing how students
use, or don't use, information when preparing, and participating in the
career fair is crucial for designing instructional activities to support
their career search. Although not specifically focused on career fairs,
phenomenography has been used to explore student experiences of
using information to learn in educational settings (e.g., Edwards, 2006;
Lupton, 2008; Maybee, 2006; Maybee, Bruce, Lupton, & Rebmann,
2017). The current research uses phenomenography to identify students' first-hand experiences of using information when participating in
a career fair.
Participants
Once our research plan was approved by our institutional review
board (IRB), we began the study. Phenomenographic research uses
“purposive sampling,” in which students were invited to participate
specifically because of their ability to provide data that would inform
the research question (Patton, 1990, p. 46). The purpose of phenomenography is to reveal or ‘uncover’ experiences of a phenomenon. As
long as the participants have experience of the phenomenon, in this
case using information to prepare for and participate in a career fair,
the number of participants may be relatively small. In contrast to other
research methodologies that aim to identify trends, each experience
revealed in a phenomenographic study, even if only held by one person,
is an important finding. One of the researchers, whose position involved
providing career support to students, invited students to participate in
the study. The seven participants interviewed were seniors in the
School of Management.
All of the participants had previously attended one or more career
fairs during their undergraduate career, and several had volunteered
with the School of Management Employers Forum (SMEF), a campus
organization that hosts career-related events and a career fair in order
to connect students with internships and career opportunities. Four of
the participants were male, three were female, and all were between the
ages of 18 and 24 years old. This study was conducted directly after a
major career fair. Within the previous week of being interviewed, each
participant had attended this career fair on campus, but had yet to
accept a position with a company.
Data collection and analysis
The seven interviews were conducted in a library conference room,
which provided a convenient, neutral space. The interviews, which
were audio-recorded, were typically 30 min in length, with the longest
taking 50 min to complete. When students arrived for the interview,
each one was asked to read over an information sheet about the study
that described our efforts to preserve anonymity, and they were apprised that they could end the participation in the study at any time.
The interviews followed a semi-structured interview protocol,
which is the most common method of collecting data in phenomenographic research. Emphasizing a second-order perspective, a specific
type of open-ended questions are used (Marton, 1986), which guide the
interviewee to “thematize” aspects of their experience about the phenomenon under investigation (Bruce, 1994). A phenomenographer
would ask, “What is your experience of information literacy?” not
“What is information literacy?” Initial prompts are followed up with
clarifying questions, such as, “Can you tell me more?” Or “Why is that
important?” that are intended to get participants to expand on their
original answers (Bowden, 2000, pp. 9–10). “Bracketing” techniques
are applied in phenomenographic interviewing, meaning that the researcher takes steps not to impose any presuppositions on the participant during the interview (Åkerlind, 2005, p. 108).
In our study, five primary interview prompts were used during the
interviews with the student participants:
Methodology
The research question guiding our study is, “How do students experience using information to prepare for and participate in a career
fair?” Phenomenography, a methodology developed in the 1970s in
Sweden by a group of educational researchers, was selected for this
study because it would allow us to understand students' firsthand experiences of using information for the career fair. Rather than using
theories to explain the data they collected (first-order perspective),
phenomenographers adopt a second-order perspective that aims to “reveal” different experiences of a phenomenon (Marton, 1986). Phenomenography holds that there are a limited number of qualitatively
different ways that people in the same context experience the same
phenomenon (Marton, 1994). For example, Bruce's (1997) seminal
phenomenographic study revealed seven different ways that educators
• Tell me about your experience of the career fair.
• How did you use information to prepare for the career fair?
• How did you use information when participating in the career fair?
• Describe your view of someone who uses information well when
preparing for, participating in, and following up on the career fair.
• Is there anything else would you share about your experience of
using information for the career fair?
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The transcriptions of the recorded interviews were then analyzed. In
a phenomenographic study, the outcome is an identification of categories, which describe key aspects of the qualitatively different ways in
which the phenomenon being researched is experienced (Marton &
Booth, 1997). The categories are not necessarily attributed to individuals, but instead may represent an aggregation of the experiences
of multiple individuals. Following phenomenographic protocols, the
researchers read though the interviews transcripts a number of times to
become familiar with them and then identified key aspects that defined
the formation of the categories. Each category is comprised of two aspects: 1) referential, and 2) structural (Marton & Booth, 1997).
Referential aspects refer to the different meanings. Structural aspects indicate what someone experiencing the phenomenon in this way
is: 1) primarily focused on, 2) in the background of their awareness, and
3) in the periphery or margins of their awareness. Described in detail in
the following section, the analysis resulted in three categories depicting
how students experienced using information to prepare for and participate in a career fair. The categories of description are arranged into an
outcome space reflecting how the categories are structurally related.
The categories of description and the outcome space represent the
collective experience as analyzed and described by the researcher.
Fig. 1. Structure of awareness for category 1.
focus is step completion. In the background, these students are aware of
the need to prepare for the career fair. These students experience using
information as conducting research on companies and positions so they
have something to show that they are prepared.
Below is an example from John, one of the students interviewed in
the study.
Results
The analysis of the interview transcripts revealed three categories
outlining the varied ways that the students experience using information to prepare for and participate in a career fair:
So, we always tell people you know, you need to do your research
for the company. You need to know what the position offers … if
you read general basics of what the company is what their recruiting
for … those are the two steps that you really need to do above all
anything else.
1. Navigator – Completes a series of steps, part of which involve using
information.
2. Performer – Prepares to engage with a recruiter that may connect
them with the ‘right’ person.
3. Aligner – Determines if a company is a match for them personally.
These students often assume that jobseekers are looking to show a
recruiter that they have the right credentials to fill a position. When
they present information, they see what they are doing as following a
defined process to display knowledge of the company. Another example
from the same subject:
Each category is described in more detail below, including its referential and structural aspects. The referential aspect conveys the
meaning of the category, while the structural aspect communicates
different layers of awareness (Marton & Booth, 1997). These layers
identify what is central to each category (i.e., its focus); elements that
are in the background and provide contextual understanding or enable
the category focus to be discerned; and elements of awareness that are
peripheral (i.e., the margin). Using pseudonyms to protect participant
anonymity, quotes from the interviews are included to exemplify the
structural aspects.
Categories may also include dimensions of variation, which are recognizable themes or common threads that traverse each category of
description. When a dimension of variation appears in each category,
its character will differ from one category to another (Åkerlind, 2005).
As shown in Table 1, two dimensions are identified in the study that
focus on what is considered information and what is considered research in each of the three categories. An outcome space describing
how the categories relate to one another concludes the results section.
So I used it for Center, this was literally yesterday. And I looked up
the night before it was about their work and solving a problem for
coal miners, what Center did and the details are gone out of my
brain now. But it was basically they were hired to help them solve a
very general basic problem of like you know, tableting. It was
something to do about the workers schedule or some sort. It was
very complicated… not my field of expertise. But then I brought it
up back when I gave my pitch: […] ‘you know, when I was doing my
research I really applaud Center's work … what you guys did for the
coal mining.’ And she, the recruiter didn't even ask me more to
follow up with that. But I think they liked that I even did that. I
think you know, that stimulated the conversation further, so I
wouldn't be just another resume in the pile, and didn't ask me to
leave or anything.
Because the Navigators experience using information as a step in a
process, they are very concerned when people do not follow the steps
required and are still successful:
Category 1: Navigator
So, for practice I was showing two underclassman that I had to show
around the career fair. I went up to a company who I had no… I
knew what they did, but I had no idea what their position was, who
Navigators experience using information to prepare for and participate in a career fair as part of a series of steps. Outlined in Fig. 1, their
Table 1
Dimensions of using information for the career fair
Navigator
Performer
Aligner
Information is…
Company information
Research is…
A preparatory step
Company information
News about the company
Finding information to connect with a recruiter
Company information
Information about one's self
Finding information that helps determine company fit
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Dilly that everyone just can't escape from. […] And so with you as
an individual trying to get a job or an internship, you need to be
quick to the point and be memorable. And I think that's how I would
view the interaction between a recruiter and a student.
Persuasion is what differentiates their approach from the
Navigators. Navigators are interested in assessing and completing the
right steps. For Performers, the steps are less defined and if you perform
well, the steps are not needed. An example of how Performers see information from Tom:
So what I realized much later on is that it's okay. You can go in with
a 2.4. Go in and talk to them. Of course I don't say you should get a
2.4, but, study hard! But I would say, go into the fair, talk to them.
Be confident. It's not something that you can develop over time,
develop instantaneously, it comes over time once you have more
experience. It took years for me. I would say I was only more
comfortable with it by the end of junior year. And that's late.
Fig. 2. Structure of awareness for category 2.
As with Navigators, making a career decision is on the margins of
students who experienced using information to prepare for and participate in a career fair as described in the Performance category. Also
similar to the Navigator category, the dimension of information in the
Performer category is company information, but also includes news
items about the company, such as current events or growth projections,
etc. (see Table 1). In the Performer category, the dimension of ‘research’
is experienced as finding information that aids the student in making a
connection with a recruiter.
they were recruiting for, whatever. I just did it for the undergraduates to see me practice and elevator pitch or talking to them.
And it went fine. It was weirdly okay. Like they told me to contact
them if I you know wanted to apply for the job and what not.
On the margin for these students was making a decision about a
company with which to pursue employment. Students who are
Navigators aren't looking for the information to change which companies to talk to or whether to continue to talk to the company. They see
information use as part of the preparation for other career fair steps.
The dimensions of this category described in Table 1 indicate that the
information students engage with is company information, while research is experienced as one of the steps that students complete to
prepare for a career fair.
Category 3: Aligner
Aligners experience using information to prepare for and participate
in the career fair as part of determining if the company is a match for
them personally. As outlined in Fig. 3, the main focus in this category is
on using information to determine ‘company fit.’ On the margins in the
Navigator and Performer categories, making a career decision is part of
determining company fit, and therefore, a focus of the Aligner category.
In the background of these students' awareness is a focus on a company's culture and other attributes, and how those elements relate their
own personal interests. Aligners may follow similar steps to those described in the Navigator category, but in the Aligner experience the
steps are focused on finding a company that matches one's personal or
professional interests. For some of these participants, the interests reflect their expectations or hopes for their career. For example, one
participant (Jasmin) volunteered in the community, so a company
having a strong corporate social responsibility was important to her:
Category 2: Performer
Performers experience using information to prepare for and participate in a career fair as a form of performance. They believe that the
short presentation they give at a career fair must allow the recruiter to
recognize that they are the right person for a position. Fig. 2 outlines
the structure of awareness for the category. The focus is on getting in
front of the right person. Their intent is to persuade using information.
In the background of the awareness of the students who experience
using information to prepare for, and participate in the career fair in
this way is ‘networking’ with a recruiter or other important contacts.
One student described how he sought out a recruiter he had met previously to keep his connection with her. Also in the background for
students with this experience is conducting research that will aid with
their performance. As an example, one participant (Caleb) saw researching to prepare for a career fair as putting together a commercial:
I did grow up volunteering at an assisted living at home in the Indy
area, so that was always important and then my high school was like
a Catholic high school and we had to do service hours, that's just
something that is really important and maybe it's like the way my
So I guess you only have so much time. It's a balance of you want to
get as much information across about you, your interest. You also
want to learn as much as you can about the company. What they
have to offer, the positions they're looking for, the types of people
they're looking for, any requirements you may or may not meet. And
you don't have time … like an infomercial, right. An infomercial's
long … it's fifteen, thirty minutes. And it's repeating the same facts
over and over and over. Where a commercial is thirty seconds,
twenty seconds. It's a spotlight, its showcasing high priority information that needs to get across to the viewer. Whereas when I'm
handing over my resume, I want to highlight big things quickly and
efficiently to get the information across. Without taking up too
much of their time, cause there are people behind me, or there's a
line and a queue of people coming. But also being memorable, right?
So in a commercial, the best commercials, marketing wise, are the
ones … the jingles, right? The Peyton Manning jingle that everyone
can't get out of his head for Nationwide, or the new Budlight Dilly
Fig. 3. Structure of awareness for category 3.
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to students, but often created a barrier where students were not using
information they learned in career fair settings since they often would
focus on fast-fact type questions. As her practice improved, the librarian
created a second version of the worksheet that included an actionable
list of tasks in research stages and a set of “mad-libs” or sample questions and answers to show how students could use information in career
fair settings (see Appendix A). As you can see from the story, originally
the librarian's practice was really only suiting Navigators, but in their
practice had started to also teach in ways that supported Performers
and the way they use information.
The librarian's practice had always centered on the assumption that
students “knew what they were looking for” and that was why they
were interested in talking to companies. It turns out that students often
had not taken the time to align their values with the task at hand, and
were often using the search process as a means of self-reflection. To use
a metaphor, students were going to a clothing store and trying on every
pair of shoes in the store, often starting at the most expensive shoe,
versus deciding before they started what type of shoe might be best.
This is certainly one way to find shoes, but it does take quite a bit longer
and arguably makes the task harder.
With the information gleaned from this study, the librarian has now
changed the handout and starts with a list of questions about what they
were looking for and what was important to them (see Appendix B). At
the same time, a given student also considers questions on what is
important to the company, such as where they are headed, what they
value, etc. Then students can draw lines from elements of what they are
looking for with a potential company, thereby suiting the type of
learning experience observed in the Aligners theme. This worksheet
was piloted in the fall and while not all students feel the need to align,
those who do seem to feel a great sense of relief at having some time to
consider the options. It appears to eliminate some of the anxiety with
starting the research process.
The career fair advisor teaches a required course on career readiness, which includes career fair preparation. The career advisor saw the
results of the study as a reaffirmation of some of the more reflective
elements of the class, such as looking at fit and personality. The career
advisor saw abundant utility in turning the study around and teaching
the students about the three categories as a tool of reflection in how
they find information, as well as how they interact with recruiters in the
career fair environment. In addition, the study made the career advisor
have many questions about transfer, or how students would be able to
use skills gained from the class in career fair environments, and was
interested in better understanding longitudinally which of the skills
taught in the sophomore class were being best retained over time.
Mom raised me, it's like I just feel so blessed in my life I want to give
back and I definitely want to give back to a company that does that,
so that's really important, and then like on my resume now I'm involved in a club I'm chair community service and like college mentor
so that's just like I think one of my key values I look for, how maybe
I've been raised and then Stryker did a lot with that so when I looked
at, that was one of their main things.
Students experiencing using information to prepare for, and participate in, a career fair as described in the Aligner category do not only
determine ‘fit’ based on social aspects, but other factors may be important as well, such as company viability. For example, another participant had worked at an internship where the company was not doing
very well financially and was likely to go bankrupt in the next couple of
years. This participant was interested in looking for companies that he
felt would be successful and stable over the next couple of years. These
students are also engaged in a larger internal process where they are
assessing their own personal interests and how they fit a company
culture.
Students in the Aligner category were less focused on networking.
Unlike Navigators or Performers, meeting the ‘right’ people is not an
end within itself. Aligners then ask those people questions to ensure
that company is indeed a good fit for them. As shown in Table 1, the
dimension of information in the Aligner category is company information—the same as with the other two categories. However, information about one's self is also part of this experience. Comparing the
two types of information informs the students' choices regarding companies with which to pursue employment. In the Aligner category, the
dimension of ‘research’ is experienced as finding information that helps
determine company fit.
Outcome space
The examination of the structural elements reveals that the Aligner
category has more complexity than the two other categories. That is to
say, the experience described in the Aligner category includes aspects
that are also part of the other two categories, such as an awareness on
preparation as outlined in the Navigator category, and networking that
is part of the experience described in the Performing category.
However, the Aligner category includes another aspect that is in the
margins of the Navigator and Performer categories: making a career
decision. While the experiences described in all three categories were
engaging in research activities, the Aligner category involves research
aimed at making a career decision by learning about a company of
interest, as well as knowing information about one's own personal or
professional interests.
Discussion
Applications for practice
After their experience at the career fair, students may participate in
multiple screening interviews, networking events, and sometimes even
portfolio show and tells or assignments. Further, a person's career trajectory extends beyond their first position as they strive towards their
ultimate career goals over the continuing decades. This study looks at a
single first step in a lifetime process that a job seeker must undertake.
More research is needed to understand the experiences inside of the
larger career search process. While we know quite a bit from the literature about what might make someone successful in their job search,
we know less about the experiences they have.
Of course, all studies have limitations. The phenomenographic
method is used to explore experiences related to the use of information.
Further studies are needed to determine how to best speak to each these
career information experiences in context. Further studies may want to
measure how teaching towards Aligners may improve career fair success. More studies are also needed to see if these three experiences are
found in the larger study population, or in the workplace at large.
Included on the research team for this study was the Assistant
Director of the career center and librarians. The implications of the
study are both for librarians helping students prepare for the career fair
as well as career advisors who also help students prepare for career
fairs. The results both confirmed previous practices of each (Kirker &
Stonebraker, 2019; Stonebraker & Howard, 2017; Stonebraker &
Fundator, 2016), but also suggested new ways to support student
learning.
One member of the research team was a business librarian who, in
the weeks before the career fair, taught 300–700 students in a number
of one-time lectures and consultations. Originally the librarian gave out
a worksheet of company questions to orient students to the type of
information needed. Students need to know how to research companies
to find out information about products, opportunities, etc. The librarian
covers a set of databases based on what stage of the research process
students occupy (see Appendix A). The librarian found this was useful
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Conclusion
recruiters.
Career fairs present a high stress time in a students' transition to
adulthood. As professionals, we may look back upon our own transition
to adulthood and forget many experiences and aspects. Students must
take their lessons from their education to reflect upon the type of
worker they would be in the workforce. In order to help students best
make this transition, universities must understand their learning and
information literacy experiences.
This study used a qualitative, phenomenographic method to investigate how students experience information in career fair environments. From this work, we found three main themes. Aligners describe
a series of experiences where the student relates company information
to who they are a person. Navigators look at information about companies as a path towards actionable steps. And Performers look to
company information to give them clues about how best impress
Appendix A. Library handout before study
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Appendix B. Library handout after study
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