Between the countless hours spent scrolling through job sites, pouring over resume edits and rewriting cover letters, job seekers have more than enough challenges on their hands. But for international students, those troubles only scratch the surface of their job hunt experience.
In the wake of COVID, international student enrollment in the 2020-2021 school year dropped by 15%, according to the Institute of International Education. Diana Vicezar, who spent her first semester of college online in her home country of Paraguay rather than at the California-based Pitzer College where she’d planned to be pre-2020, knows firsthand that the lack of support for international students became only more glaring over the course of the pandemic.
“One thing I did to keep sane during this time was talk to other international students studying in the U.S.,” says Vicezar. “ I ended up talking to more than a hundred international students, and the one topic that came up in all those conversations was how difficult it was to apply for internships and jobs in the U.S.”
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It became increasingly clear to Vicezar that international students do not have access to career development resources that cater to their needs, especially if they come from smaller U.S. colleges. In turn, Vicezar founded Mapis, a free career development platform built specifically for international students.
“International students spend months just trying to find a job open to us,” she says. “There are not many resources out there, so that inspired me to create a platform where I could centralize all the opportunities open to international students.”
Mapis includes a centralized database of internships, fellowships, entry level jobs and exploratory career programs that accept Curricular Practical Training and Optional Practical Training authorizations. These employment authorizations allow international students to engage in U.S.-based work relevant to their area of study.
The platform also features one-on-one advising sessions, where international students can learn more about the internship and job application process, and learn how to write a resume and cover letter. While many colleges already have career centers for a similar purpose, Vicezar notes that their guidance is done with American students in mind.
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“Most international students coming to the U.S. do not know what a cover letter is or how to write an American-style resume,” she says. “You cannot give the same advice to us that you would give to an American student. Our circumstances are different.”
Richard Ampah, a Mapis ambassador and user from Ghana and STEM student, recalls that more often than not, it’s the international student’s responsibility to know the ins and outs of the application process.
“Depending on the college’s connection and social networks, the resources could be so limited,” says Ampah, who’s currently looking for STEM research opportunities. “International students don’t get the right answers to our questions and have to do all the research ourselves.”
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Beyond career advisers, Mapis connects users to recruiters and former international students from companies like Bloomberg, Google, Twitter, McKinsey and TikTok via weekly webinars. Users can ask questions about the respective companies’ recruitment processes and policies on diversity and inclusion, explains Vicezar.
While Mapis is still in its beta version and at capacity with 100 users, Vicezar plans to open the beta version to all international students by the end of the year. In the meantime, Vicezar wants to add a section for articles on career development and a mentorship database with over 100 former international students. Vicezar also emphasizes the importance of Mapis remaining free in an effort to democratize what could otherwise be costly resources.
“Many agencies would charge something like $200 to review your resume, and some international students don’t have $200 to spare,” says Vicezar. “All international students deserve access to the same kind of resources and opportunities. It doesn’t matter if you go to an Ivy League or a community college, you’re going to have access to the same platform.”
For Ampah, this still doesn’t mean the job hunt will be easy, but at least it will be manageable.
“It’s challenging because most of the research opportunities are given to domestic students and permanent residents,” he says. “But Mapis will reduce the stress of trying to find internships, which is a process that combined with academics, affects our mental health and GPA.”
