The Austin J. Waldron Student-Alumni Connections Program
About the Program
The Waldron Student-Alumni Connections Program helps undergraduate students connect with alumni for career exploration and planning in a variety of ways:
- We host panels in which alumni discuss how their arts and sciences background informed their career,
- We host industry-specific conversations,
- We offer professional skills development workshops, and
- We host on-site treks to Chicago businesses so students can experience a particular business or industry first-hand.
Featured Program Offerings and Events
Ask a Wildcat
Get great advice and answers to your specific questions from a community of over 80,000 Northwestern alumni.
Learn more about Ask A WildCat with articles from The Daily Northwestern and Weinberg News.
Student-Alumni Connections Events
Programs include alumni panels, industry-specific discussions, podcasts, and more.
Weinberg College Career Summit
The eighth annual Weinberg College Career Summit was held virtually and in person in September 2024. Watch Dave Revsine (WCAS '91) give his keynote address during the inaugural career summit.
Relevant Reads
Explore articles that articulate the value of a liberal arts education and networking.
- Mark Cuban: Liberal Arts is the Future, Business Insider
- A 29-year-old hedge fund manager reveals why he loves hiring liberal arts majors, Business Insider
- Why America's Business Majors Are in Desperate Need of a Liberal Arts Degree, The Atlantic
- That "Useless" Liberal Arts Degree Has Become Tech's Hottest Ticket, Forbes
- We Don't Need More STEM Majors. We Need More STEM Majors with Liberal Arts Training, The Washington Post
- You Finally Selected a College, Don't Start Worrying About Your Major, The Washington Post
- How Humanities Degrees Cultivate Marketable Business Skills, Entrepreneur
About Austin J. Waldron '78
Austin J. Waldron (’78) had planned to become a doctor. “It was the only thing I had ever thought of,” Waldron says. But by the end of his sophomore year, after a few pre-med classes, he realized that career path was not the right one for him. Like many students who pursue a particular major but later decide to change paths, Waldron engaged in a certain degree of soul-searching. “I thought, ‘What do I do now? What do I tell my parents and my grandparents?’"
Waldron ultimately decided to major in psychology and discovered a rewarding path that he never could have anticipated when he first arrived at Northwestern. He realized that myriad career options were open to him, and that the skills he had gained as an arts and sciences student prepared him to pursue any of them. In 2016, he retired after a 37-year career at HCSC, where he had risen to serve as senior vice president of operations.
“Operations is not a field you learn about in high school,” he notes with a laugh. But it turned out to be a perfect fit for Waldron, who enjoyed working in many different aspects of the organization, and appreciated the flexibility afforded by his arts and sciences degree.
Waldron wants today’s Weinberg College students to realize that they, too, can pursue many paths, regardless of the major they declare. “My goal is to encourage more students to realize that if their plans change, that’s OK,” he says. “With a liberal arts degree, you can always pivot to pursue a new path. The goal is to pursue something that you are going to be happy with."