Pol Le & Donald Keough, Staff Writers—

The Austin E. Knowlton Foundation, a philanthropic fund that promotes and advances higher education across the midwest, recently gifted Denison $11 million. The donation will go towards funding the Knowlton Center for Career Exploration; with the added revenue, Knowlton is looking to expand and test new programs. 

When sharing about the potential allocation of this donation, Laurie Kamerer, the Associate Vice President of Career Development and Executive Director of Denison Edge said, “Denison’s strategic plan outlines five or six of the most important priorities for the next five years, and one of those [priorities] is career readiness. We collaborate closely with departments all across campus on career readiness, specifically.”

Knowlton  has recently been implementing different events and programming, such as the Journey Program, bootcamps, networking panels, visiting speakers and recruiters as well as hired instructors to help in training workforce skills. These initiatives are all part of Knowlton’s goal toward equipping students with the skills and knowledge needed to succeed in their future careers. 

Knowlton recently hosted an etiquette dinner that taught students proper professionalism at the table. Students learned how to navigate the differences in table etiquette between the Continental and American style of dining.

“One of the best pieces of advice I got out of dinner was a networking tip from the instructor [which was] ‘When you walk into the room, don’t think that the room is full of people, think that the room is full of stories for you to discover.’” Nhi Le ’24 said. 

For Le, the experience provided insights that she may someday implement at dinners or events for her future career. 

“[The dinner] was super successful,” Kamerer said. “We’ll be able to carry forward etiquette dinners and things like that because we have this donation.” 

During Fall Break, Knowlton hosted an off-campus Journey Program to help students explore their future careers. It was an immersive three-day experience where students traveled to Mohican Lodge with five faculty members. 

The program began with ice-breakers, followed by a bonfire with s’mores; the students also got to spend their morning on a hike. The teaching components of the Journey Program lay in the four-session planning process: Reflect, Imagine, Plan and Build.

The program included detailed advice from Knowlton advisors, providing insights to participating students on how to visualize their career trajectory, apply for internships, write resumes and cover letters and how to perform well on interviews. 

Huyen Bach ‘26, a participant, shared her experience with her direct advisor, Joshua.

“He answered all of my career-related questions; he told me to think about everything I wanted to do in the past, and to write it down,” Bach’ 26 said. 

After the event, Bach concluded that she wanted to find a job near Vietnam, so that she could be closer to her parents; she expressed interest in the hospitality industry or being a pianist.

The donation will also aid in the sustainable implementation of specialized trips and programming. Recently, this includes plans to organize annual trips to a cadaver lab at Ohio University. 

“[The cadaver lab trip] was a really meaningful experience for those students that went,” Kamerer said. 

“But we never baked that into our plan as a yearly thing until now [when we have] a gift that can cover the addition of yearly events.” 

Other potential programs this donation could make possible include a trip to New York wherein students can learn about investment banking and finance, a one credit pre-law course for students and taking aspiring medical students to different cities that they’re considering for their future studies. 

While the exact allocation of $11 million donation will vary, Knowlton is committed to empower students to design their own future.