Your K-Plan Story Guide

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The K-Plan is a four-part, integrated approach to an excellent education in the liberal arts and sciences.
K-Plan Aspects * Required

Let’s talk aboutyour K-Plan experience:

How have you customized your college experience to help you achieve success at K and beyond?
How has your academic journey prepared you for life after K?
If you studied abroad/away, where did you go, what did you learn, and how did that experience change you?
What independent research experience do you have? If you have completed or are in the process of completing a SIP, what is its title and contribution to scholarship?
What other experiential opportunities have you undertaken (civic engagement, internships, leadership roles, social justice activism, etc.), and how have those shaped who you are today?


Let’s talk aboutthe transferable skills acquired through these experiences:

According to the National Association of Colleges & Employers (NACE), there are 8 core competencies that serve as the foundation for career readiness. As a result of engagement in each individual aspect of the K-Plan, how have you demonstrated your skill in each of them?

Critical Thinking: How did you identify and respond to needs based upon an understanding of situational context and logical analysis of relevant information?

Communication: How did you clearly and effectively exchange information, ideas, facts, and perspectives with persons inside and outside of an organization?
Career & Self-Development: How did you proactively develop yourself and your career through continual personal and professional learning, awareness of your strengths and weaknesses, navigation of career opportunities, and networking to build relationships within and without one’s organization?
Equity & Inclusion: How did you demonstrate the awareness, attitude, knowledge, and skills required to equitably engage and include people from different local and global cultures? How did you engage in anti-racist practices that actively challenge the systems, structures, and policies of racism?
Leadership: How did you recognize and capitalize on personal and team strengths to achieve organizational goals?
Professionalism: Knowing work environments differ greatly, how did you understand and demonstrate effective work habits, and act in the interest of the larger community and workplace?

Teamwork: How did you build and maintain collaborative relationships to work effectively toward common goals, while appreciating diverse viewpoints and shared responsibilities?

Technology: How did you understand and leverage technologies ethically to enhance efficiencies, complete tasks, and accomplish goals?


Let’s talk aboutSample RÉSUMÉ Action Statements

The K-Plan is a special representation of what Kalamazoo College has to offer; you should make sure that you overtly highlight your experiences with it on your resume and in cover letters and personal statements. Using this list of sample active verbs, what are some resume action statements that you might consider using to insert into your career-related documents?
Categorized List of Action Verbs
Who would you like to send this information to? All submissions will automatically default to career@kzoo.edu. Please include your email address here if you’d like to send a copy to yourself.

Disclaimer: Because each student’s experience will vary, use this resource as a general guide for telling your unique story.

Academic Experience

CCPD Tips

Behavioral Interview Prompts

Employers often ask questions about how you responded to specific situations. For example:


• Tell me about a time when you experienced a conflict while working on a team.
• Describe a time when you had to work well under pressure.
• Give me an example of a time when you showed initiative and took the lead.
• Tell me about a time when you made a mistake, and how you handled it.

S.T.A.R. Method

You can use S.T.A.R. as a framework to structure your response to behavioral interview questions.

• Describe the context and background for a situation that’s relevant to the question.
• Explain the task that needed to be completed. What was the goal?
• Outline specific actions you took. How did you exhibit transferable skills?
• Share the results of your actions. What was the outcome? What did you learn?

Your K Story: Highlighting your academic experience