SIFE continues community work, entrepreneurship

University group Students In Free Enterprise began work this semester on a Web site dedicated to job seekers and potential employers.

“It’s like a combination of Myspace.com and Monster.com,” Robert Collier, vice president of SIFE said. The Web site, which is its preliminary stages, allows users to post not only resumes, but introduction videos of themselves, mock interviews and pictures.

“It allows employers to see not just paper or statistics,” Collier said, “but to see communication skills and leadership.”

Collier said he wants business and technology students to send resumes to resumes@interviewmelive.com to build up the site’s inventory of job seekers before the Nov. 18 career fair.

The site, www.interviewmelive.com, is just one of SIFE’s projects this semester.

Collier said the organization is working on a project to bring clean water to Mexico by manufacturing ceramic water filters.

He said the project not only gives villages clean water, but teaches the Mexican citizens to manufacture the filters themselves.

SIFE has students in more than 40 countries with an estimated 38,000 students involved, according to the SIFE Web site.

Students in SIFE have helped countries world-wide expand free enterprise and entrepreneurship.

SIFE students in England helped Ghana villagers start their own beekeeping business, expanding revenue by 80 percent. SIFE students in Brazil helped create jobs for women by starting a chocolate factory, according to the site.

SIFE is governed by Fortune 500 CEOs ranging from Campbell soup CEO Douglas R. Conant, to executives from Wal-Mart and JC Penny.

Collier said students who want to separate themselves from the crowd should join student organizations like SIFE.

“What’s going to differentiate you from those with the same academic credentials?” Collier asked. “It’s extra-curricular activities.”

By Allen Arrick Editor in Chief