Wright-Swadel explains that students respond favorably to aggressive on-campus recruiting.

And Cover points to an increasing sense that Teach for America can be a launching pad for other public service-oriented careers as something that bolsters the program’s cache.

“As people see more and more kids who do Teach for America and then go on to advise a governor on education policy, or to be a Supreme Court justice, or to medical school, where they work in a clinic in a disadvantaged neighborhood—the more people see that there are many paths to work towards the same mission, I think it’s increased our credibility,” Cover says.

ALL ROADS LEAD TO ROME

If Wright-Swadel had one lesson to impart to the graduating senior class, it would be that “career change is very normal for Harvard students.”

He says that conversations with alumni reveal that most took very circuitous paths to get where they are today.

But he says he has a hard time convincing Harvard undergraduates that building a set of transferable skills is more important than having a linear plan for how to get from Commencement day to the ultimate dream job.

“Many students who come here had a plan,” he says. “It may have come from a professional, it may have come from a parent, it may have come from themselves or some combination—but there was a series of things one did in order to get to Harvard. The downside of that is as much as we see variations in how one got to Harvard, you all look and say whatever linear plan you had worked.”

“And so the question when you get to us is, ‘If I want to ____, what 27 steps do I need to take?”

Wright-Swadel argues that 15-20 years down the line, our class will be working in jobs that don’t even exist now. Thus, he says that Harvard students should focus their career planning on building a particular skill set—and not climbing a particular ladder. For him, the question is not “What are you doing after graduation?” but “What are you learning?”

—Staff writer Kate L. Rakoczy at rakoczy@post.harvard.edu.