UK Joins Forces with Forté Foundation to Help Women College Students Become Career Ready

LEXINGTON, Ky. (March 16, 2018) — The University of Kentucky recently made a bold move to help women undergraduates become more career ready. By joining more than 25 other schools of the Forté Foundation’s Rising Star Initiative, UK will offer women undergraduates of all majors the opportunity to develop skills in five critical "career ready" areas — career exploration, personal branding, job searching, networking and professional values.

Forté Rising Star participants progress through a self-directed, interactive curriculum while earning points toward a Forté Career Ready designation. An online community offers discussions, mentorship, personal branding tips, résumé review and much more. Completion of the program and receipt of the Forté Career Ready designation is a signal to employers that these women have the skills necessary for a smooth transition to a business environment.

"The Rising Star Initiative at UK is a collaborative effort led by the Lewis Honors College, Gatton College of Business and Economics, and Office of the Provost," said Sally Foster, director of the Center for Personal Development in the Lewis Honors College and co-leader of the project. "We are thrilled to provide the professional and career development resources that the Forté Foundation offers for our female students.  It is an exciting time to get additional campus partners involved as we do a soft launch event with students in April and plan for the full roll-out in the fall."

The student information session in April will provide details about the program, ways to get involved and leadership opportunities. It will be held at 5 p.m. Wednesday, April 11, at the Hilary J. Boone Center library. The session will be held in conjunction with a Pearls of Wisdom event scheduled for 6 p.m. at the same location.  Pearls of Wisdom is a panel discussion and networking reception connecting female students with successful women from the alumni and Lexington community.  

"We are thrilled to expand our already outstanding group of Forté Rising Star sponsors with the addition of the University of Kentucky," said Elissa Sangster, executive director of Forté Foundation. "The goal of Forté Rising Stars is to help women prepare for a career, and it does that in a fun way. While they are learning, participants also network and make friends with undergrad women from other universities who are also building career skills."

Forté Foundation is a nonprofit consortium of leading multinational corporations and top universities in the US and abroad, and the Graduate Management Admission Council. Its mission is to launch women into fulfilling, significant careers through access to business education, opportunities and a community of successful women. Forté is the leading organization that provides a national infrastructure for women at all stages of the career continuum to access the information, scholarship support and networking connections they need to succeed in business careers. Additional information about the Forté Foundation is available online at www.fortefoundation.org.

Forté Sponsor Companies: A.T. Kearney; Accenture; Amazon; American Airlines; AT&T; Bank of America Merrill Lynch; Barclays; Bloomberg; Boston Consulting Group; Capital Group; Chevron; Citi; Cognizant; Credit Suisse; Danaher; DaVita; Deloitte; Deutsche Bank; Dow; Eli Lilly and Company; Evercore; ExxonMobil; EY; General Motors; Goldman Sachs; Google; Guggenheim Partners; Hines; IBM Global Business Services; Invesco; JP Morgan; KPMG; Lazard; Liberty Mutual; M&T Bank; Macquarie Group; McKinsey & Company; PIMCO; Prologis; State Street; The PNC Financial Services Group; UGI Corporation; US Cellular; Wellington Management; Wells Fargo; Whirlpool Corporation

Forté Nonprofit Sponsors: 100 Women in Finance; Certified Financial Planner Board; CFA Institute; Graduate Management Admission Council (GMAC)

Forté Business School Sponsors: Alliance Manchester Business School; Arizona State University W.P. Carey School of Business; Babson College (F.W. Olin Graduate School of Business); Carnegie Mellon University (Tepper School of Business); Columbia Business School; Cornell University (SC Johnson College of Business); Dartmouth College (Tuck School of Business); Duke University (The Fuqua School of Business); Emory University (Goizueta Business School); ESADE; Georgetown University (McDonough School of Business); George Washington University School of Business; Georgia Tech (Scheller College of Business); Harvard Business School; HEC-Paris; IE Business School; IESE Business School; Imperial College Business School; Indiana University - Bloomington (Kelley School of Business); INSEAD; London Business School; Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Sloan); Michigan State University (Broad College of Business); New York University (Stern School of Business); Northwestern University (Kellogg School of Management); Ohio State University Fisher College of Business; Queen’s Smith School of Business; Rice University Jesse H. Jones Graduate School of Business; Southern Methodist University (Cox School of Business); University of California - Berkeley (Haas School of Business); University of California - Los Angeles (Anderson School of Management); University of Cambridge (Judge Business School); University of Chicago (Booth School of Business); University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (Gies College of Business); University of Maryland Smith School of Business; University of Michigan (Ross School of Business); University of Minnesota - Twin Cities (Carlson School of Management); University of North Carolina (Kenan-Flagler Business School); University of Notre Dame (Mendoza College of Business); University of Oxford (Saïd Business School); University of Pennsylvania (The Wharton School); University of Rochester (Simon School of Business); University of Southern California (Marshall School of Business); University of Texas at Austin (McCombs School of Business); University of Toronto (Rotman School of Management); University of Virginia (Darden School of Business); University of Washington (Foster School of Business); Vanderbilt University Owen Graduate School of Management; Washington University in St. Louis (Olin Business School); Western University (Ivey School of Management); Yale School of Management; York University (Schulich School of Business)

Forté University Sponsors: Amherst College; Babson College; Bryn Mawr College; Carlow University; Carnegie Mellon University; College of William & Mary; Cornell University; Georgetown University; George Washington University; Howard University; Indiana University; Miami University of Ohio; Mount Holyoke College; New York University; Penn State University; Purdue University; Rutgers University; Smith College; Texas A&M University; University of Chicago; University of Kentucky; University of Maryland; University of Michigan: University of Minnesota; University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill; University of Toronto;  Vanderbilt University;  Vassar College;  Washington University at St. Louis; and Yale University.