Employers seek out students in reverse career fair
Students sit at booths while employers line up to sell themselves in the first-ever reverse career fair at UTM.
On November 18 at 6 p.m., the Kaneff Centre was the stage for an unusual career fair—employers queued at booths to talk to students, rather than the other way around. This was the scene at the University of Toronto (U of T) Mississauga (UTM)’s first-ever “reverse” career fair, held for the 53 students who just completed the 12-week UTM CC100: Career and Work Readiness Program.
In the fair’s opening ceremony, Career Centre Employment Strategist Ron Wener described CC100 as a course that gives “students a period of time to explore careers, what they want to do, and job-related skills.”
Sasha Thornhill, employment strategist at the Career Centre and an organizer of the fair, explained that they wanted the reverse career fair to be “a culmination of the students’ progress in the course where they could apply everything they learned to connect with employers.”
After a five-minute opening ceremony, employers had one hour to visit students at their booths. The career fair showcased students from many different programs, such as Geospatial Data Science, Computer Science, Chemistry, Finance, History and Language Teaching and Learning.
Each student was well-prepared for the event. Every conversation, rather than being a rehearsed presentation, was natural. Students had time to reveal their unique features and stories, and it drew me in.
The responsibility of initiating conversations and asking questions shifted the dynamic of each interview, allowing students to leave a stronger impression. For example, during a conversation with Muhammad Hassan, a third-year student majoring in geospatial data science and physical geography, an initial mention of his degree led—after follow-up questions — to an in-depth explanation of the research he has conducted. His detailed responses highlighted a clear passion for marine science.
The reverse career fair also allowed students to show demos of their projects, including Hassan Eissa—a fifth-year geospatial data science major—who displayed an image shader that can detect vegetation in an area, and Muhammed Ibrahim—a third-year accounting specialist—who provided a detailed stock analysis of Loblaws.
The next hour of the event was an open networking session, where students and employers were free to move around and talk to each other. The first hour allowed students to identify who was interested in them. In the second hour, students continued conversations with companies or people they were interested in. The event concluded with some employers sharing the open positions they had, and with students and employers filling out feedback forms about the event.
In interviews with The Medium, attendees generally expressed that they enjoyed the event and even preferred it over traditional career fairs.
Jamie Kunkel, a career counsellor from the team, shared that students found it “nice to be in control” of the conversation around them. The new format evened the power balance between students and employers, which allowed for more natural conversations.
Zainab Al-Zadjali, a second-year economics and chemistry major, said she benefited from the new structure, especially following negative experiences with normal career fairs.
“I would have to line up behind an employer’s booth before I get to talk to them,” Al-Zadjali recounted. “Then, when I finally reached an employer, I could only talk to them for a minute because there were still people behind me.” The reverse format empowered Al-Zadjali to have a conversation with the employer and connect with them on a deeper level.
However, not all students found the reverse career fair beneficial. Max Weerasinghe, a third-year accounting specialist and economics major, argued that the event “did not have a lot of accounting or finance industry representation.” He observed that many of the employers who attended were actually from U of T themselves, so they could not offer him any concrete positions. “I enjoyed many of the conversations and got a lot of good advice, but I didn’t get any solid work opportunities.”
Weerasinghe reasoned that this was probably because this was the first reverse career fair, and the industry representation would gradually improve in future iterations. He also shared that the person in the booth next to him was offered a position on the spot.
Many of the employers seemed to enjoy the event as well. Engineering Supervisor Hussein Hassanali of Martinrea International commented that the reverse format “was a great change of pace from just standing at a booth.”
UTM introduced CC100 in the fall 2025 semester with three different modalities: a 12-week in-person course, a 12-week virtual course and an intensive three-day course during reading week. Thornhill shared that they plan to host another reverse career fair for CC100’s winter cohort.
The registration for the 12-week winter cohort ends on January 6, 2026, and the registration for the three-day intensive Winter cohort ends on February 8, 2026.
Features Editor (Volume 51); Associate Features Editor (Volume 50) — Madhav is a third year student completing a double major in mathematics and computer science, and a minor in professional writing. Everyone in UTM has a unique story that makes them special and deserves to be told. As the Features Editor, Madhav wants to narrate these types of stories with creative and descriptive writing. In his off-time, Madhav loves watching anime, reading manga or fantasy novels and listening to music.