FranU, LCTCS Announce Transition to Handshake

Franciscan Missionaries of Our Lady University and The Louisiana Community and Technical College System announced May 5 that both institutions have joined Handshake - an early talent recruitment platform connecting employers, talent and colleges - to retain graduates in the region by connecting students to careers through experiential learning opportunities. LCTCS and FranU join LSU and Southern University on the platform, meaning that students from all traditional two and four-year institutions in the region will be accessible to employers through a single employer account. The announcement was made at the Baton Rouge Area Chamber’s Signature Speaker event presented by IBERIAbank.

“How powerful is this statement: As of today, we can say that every business in the Capital Region can access every student in the Capital Region on one platform for free,” said Adam Knapp, president and CEO of BRAC. “Job access is the first step to ensuring that every student can stay in our market after college, should they choose to. The Baton Rouge Area is the only region in the country with the leadership and collaboration amongst its higher education partners to align behind a single recruitment tool.”

Students from LCTCS, which includes Baton Rouge Community College and River Parishes Community College in the Capital Region, and FranU will be activated in the Handshake platform on May 6 .

Dr. Monty Sullivan, system president of LCTCS, said, “We are excited for this opportunity to join BRAC, Southern, LSU, FranU and other industry supporters in this opportunity to provide internship and employment opportunities for all of our students. The ability to streamline recruitment and the job seeking process for employers and students is a game changer. Our students have many competing interests and the Handshake platform will help make their respective searches for internships or fulltime employment less stressful. This collaboration is workforce development in real-time and embodies the power of partnerships.”

Dr. Tina Holland, president of FranU, said, "FranU is grateful to be part of this important collaborative effort. Given that our mission is to prepare highly skilled professionals, integrated thinkers and faith-filled citizens, FranU graduates add significant value to the organizations they serve. Many thanks to BRAC for their work in retaining such high-quality graduates to the region. Many thanks as well to our partners at LCTCS who, beyond establishing a system-wide transfer agreement with FranU, collaborated further to help us adopt Handshake much sooner than originally planned."

This initiative is of particular significance for small to mid-sized employers, which make up 88 percent of the Baton Rouge market. Baton Rouge college students are most frequently connected with experiential learning opportunities at large businesses, those with formalized human resources departments and budgets, according to a study conducted by SSA Consultants for BRAC on the region’s internship ecosystem. Smaller employers often have less internal resources to invest in a traditional strategy for recruiting talent. Handshake allows those companies to recruit on a level playing field and better engage with college career centers, while also increasing awareness among students of the diversity of career paths available to them in the Baton Rouge Area.

Handshake allows employers of all sizes to create a free profile, through which they can recruit talent from BRCC, RPCC, FranU, LSU, Southern University, and any of the other 900+ universities on the platform. Employers are able to post jobs, prioritize and filter candidates, schedule interviews and register for recruiting events from one singular login.

BRCC, RPCC and FranU will join the existing collaboration with BRAC, LSU and Southern University that holds both the higher ed institutions and BRAC accountable for expanding the number of active student and employer profiles in the system, implementing a data tracking strategy to measure progress, advocating for paid internships as both a critical component of curriculum and of talent pipeline management strategies, and collaborating to increase awareness of the region as a vibrant community in which to consider launching a career.

Since the initial announcement between BRAC, LSU and Southern University in September, over 100 additional BRAC investor businesses have created employer profiles, and over 10,800 new student and alumni have activated job seeker profiles.

Regional businesses are encouraged to take the following steps within the next six months to support and participate in this effort:

· Activate a free employer account on Handshake

· Create a paid internship program and recruit through Handshake

· Recruit candidates for entry-level positions through Handshake

More information about Handshake and the regional partnership is available at brac.org/handshake.