Among the planned additions to the career expos is website that would allow students to take a work personality assessment and build a career profile that can help direct them to some possibilities ahead of time.
A young man working in his uncle’s pan-Asian restaurant around the turn of the millenium, Mike Mercatoris was prepping to-go orders and listening to his headphones when the kitchen’s head chef nabbed his attention.
Students attending the GlenX Career Expo held in Spring 2020.
Jayne Poss said her passion lies in helping students find opportunities that empower them to decide what they want to pursue after graduating high school.
“Over and over I heard (the students’) biggest takeaway was to be able to have these in-person conversations,” said Poss, the director of GlenX Career Expo. “And how much they enjoyed talking to the businesses and … the businesses actually wanting to talk to them and learn about what they were looking for.”
Poss and the founder of GlenX, Altai Chuluun, used the pandemic as an opportunity to create a virtual career expo for juniors and seniors at the nine high schools from Aspen to Parachute. For the past four years, the expos have been in person and drawn interest and involvement from more than 180 valley-based companies. Poss said it is beneficial for students and businesses to have the in-person conversations about interests, qualifications and openings,
Chelsea Self / Post Independent
When the coronavirus pandemic and ownership changes idled the Sunlight Mountain Inn outside Glenwood Springs earlier this year, Altai Chuluun saw a new opportunity to cultivate entrepreneurship.
For several years now, the founder and organizer of the GlenX business success summits and youth career fairs has been promoting the concept of co-working and co-learning as a way for people to do business in a group setting.
Part of that original vision was carried forth in the form of the spin-off nonprofit Coventure business incubator in Carbondale, now run by Chuluun’s former nonprofit partner Mike Lowe and Tyler Moebius.