Speaker: Christian Garcia, Associate Dean and Executive Director, Toppel Career Center-University of Miami
This award honors your career & impact on NACE members. What's motivated you to get involved & stay involved with NACE throughout the years?
Christian Garcia: Hi, everyone. It's Christian and I'm here with my NACE Mackes Leadership Award, which is this beautiful Waterford Crystal. And yes, I put popcorn in it because I'm gonna watch a movie after this. But what has kept me involved with NACE all these years? So my first NACE conference was in 2001, in Las Vegas. My first time in career services and I was hooked. And really what has kept me involved all these years is the people. I've met some amazing people throughout the years that I've become very close friends with people that I can count on professionally and personally. And obviously lots of great knowledge. I've learned a lot, I've been able to be a leader within NACE, serve on the board and done a lot of different things. So that has kept me involved and has kept me motivated. So that's why I'm still here.
Can you tell us about one or two accomplishments you’ve had with NACE for which you are particularly proud of?
Christian Garcia: So when I think of accomplishments that I've done with or I had with NACE that have meant the most to me, I would say one of them is serving as a faculty member for the Management Leadership Institute for about, I think I did it for three years. I've always said that my own personal experience with MLI as a student in 2003 was pivotal for me as a leader within career services and to be able to give back and to talk about branding and marketing and was really, really great, I got to meet some great people and just to kind of pay it forward and pass it along to the younger newer members. So I would say that's one. The other thing that I'm very proud of, you know, I think it's very well known that I'm, I'm outspoken about things and, you know, after the events of summer 2020, you know, social unrest in this country being heard by NACE and given the platform to be able to share my feelings, my experiences, my recommendations to the leadership at NACE but also to be part of you know, programs, webinars where we were able to deliver content about this very important topic at a time that was really important in our, in our country and the world. So I would say that's another accomplishment that I'm very proud of being part of NACE.
