Into the Professional World

Two years ago today, I moved into my very first apartment in Pensacola, FL. I had no job, enough money to pay the rent through October, and was about to start grad school. Today, I am happy to announce that I am officially a full-time employee of the University of West Florida. I will be a full-time hall director for a first year, living learning community building. I am super excited that I have this opportunity.

So many of you may know (if you've read my blog or talked to me in the past several months) that my job search hasn't been the most successful. There were definitely times this summer when I was ready to give up on searching, but I didn't. It was hard to receive so many rejections, but in the end I was in the right place at the right time to transition into the role I now have with UWF.

I thought it might be interesting to compile some of my job search stats.

Cecilia's Job Search Stats 2013

• # of states where jobs applied for were located: 25
• # of states where jobs interviewed for were located: 15
• Total # of interviews: 34
• Phone intreviews: 5
• Campus interviews: 5 interviews in 5 states
• Schools interviewed with: 26
• Length of job search (from preparing resume to job offer): 9 months
• Length of job search (from first interview to job offer): 5 months
• Being appointed to a position: Priceless

I'm super excited to continue working with the wonderful UWF staff. I'm sad that my last day at Panera Bread is approaching, but happy that the amazing people there will still be in my life. As many of you know, I've wanted to get out of Florida since my years as an undergrad, but I'm really happy to be staying in Pensacola.

I <3 Panera Bread.

Thanks to everyone who has been supportive over these past several months. I had some really rough times, and I never let on to much of it, but I couldn't have made it through all of this without the people around me.

P.S. How many people can say they went to Alaska and Hawaii for free? It was unbelivably worth it! Just sayin'.