Rutgers Business School apologizes for rejecting students from career fair
Rutgers Business School (RBS) Dean Lei Lei apologized on behalf of the school’s administration on Wednesday for turning away students at their career fair last Friday.
The Office of Career Management will help students contact recruiters if they were unable to meet with them last week, she said in a statement to The Daily Targum.
“We regret that the actions at last week’s career fair adversely affected some of our students and cast a shadow over the success we have achieved in helping our students secure more meaningful internships and jobs,” she said.
Rutgers Business School Director of Communications and Marketing Daniel Stoll said the school’s administrators will be revising the dress code guidelines, and that they would likely take in student input during this process.
A change.org petition asked Business School Director Eugene Gentile to apologize to students, as well as for the school to revise its dress code.
“Navy is the most popular color on Wall Street for suits. It is very unfortunate that students were turned away from the career fair for committing the crime of being fashionable,” according to the petition. “... RBS needs to recognize navy as appropriate business attire because the whole world already does.”
Read the full statement below:
The administration at Rutgers Business School apologizes to the students who were turned away from the Feb. 10 job fair because of a dress code policy.
After a meeting with the deans on Tuesday Feb. 14, the Office of Career Management in New Brunswick and Newark contacted the affected students to assist them in reconnecting with recruiters. In addition, the deans at Rutgers Business School are scheduled to meet with the affected students next week. A review of the dress code is already underway and will be revised to ensure that it does not exclude students from opportunities to meet with employers in the future.
As a top public business school in the Northeast, we take great pride in our students, both academically and professionally. We regret that the actions at last week’s career fair adversely affected some of our students and cast a shadow over the success we have achieved in helping our students secure meaningful internships and jobs.
Our career management process is not perfect, and we look forward to working with our recruiters and students to further improve our practices, including the dress code guidelines.
Lei Lei, Dean of Rutgers Business School–Newark and New Brunswick
Nikhilesh De is a correspondent for The Daily Targum. He is a School of Arts and Sciences senior. Follow him on Twitter @nikhileshde for more.
