Student job employment opportunity
Students observing pallets.
Full-time job
The packaging industry is very broad. It includes a variety of business sectors including design, business, marketing, engineering, and material-based manufacturing industries.
For the last 10 years, around 90% of students received job offers before or right after their graduation. They are currently working at packaging converters (plastics, glass, metal, paper and paperboard, corrugated), Consumer Packages Goods (CPG) companies (food, cosmetic, medical, pharmaceutical, and other general products), tertiary packaging companies (distribution, transportation, warehouse, pallet, or supply chain) as either packaging engineer or packaging designer.
Student moving boxes to test equipment while other students observe.
Co-op or internship
At the Virginia Tech packaging program, the industrial internship or coop is not a requirement for graduation. But we are strongly encouraging our students to go out for industrial internship or coop before their graduation. Higher than 90% of our current students are doing summer internship or a semester coop in their junior or senior years.
How to find job opportunities
We have an annual spring packaging career fair to assist our students to find more job opportunities in packaging. We help our students to find their job opportunities through the close collaboration with the College of Natural Resources and Environment and other colleges such as Pamplin College of Business and the College of Engineering which are recognized as one of best career fairs in the country by evaluations from recruiters who attend.
- Annual Fall CNRE Career Fair: In the middle of September
- Annaul SPRING CNRE Career Fair: In the middle of February
- Engineering Expo: In the middle of September
- Business Horizon Career Fair: In the middle of February
- Handshake and LinkedIn
- Other job searching engine: Ineed.com or Monster.com
How to build up students’ professional identity
- The VT packaging student club: The VT packaging student club is one of the most active student organizations at Virginia Tech. The club is designed for student’s career development. Industrial speakers or infosession are regularly invited every semester. To develop student’s industrial network, students also attend to two major national and international packaging events such as PackExpo and Packaging Jamboree at fall and spring semester, respectively.
- Student career service: The VT packaging program offers a resume work program in the packaging courses, for example: “Start-Up Your Future”: SBIO 3214. In this class, students will prepare their resume, cover letter and e-portfolio under the guidance of faculty in person.