Career Support
"I love Arabic - but how do I prepare for post-grad?"
Alumni of the Arabic program at Swarthmore achieve high success across many career fields, and we feature highlights from them on our website! You can directly connect with our alumni for informational interviews via the Alumni Portal, and we encourage first-generation and/or low-income (FLI) students to seek out additional mentorship through the Rubin Scholars program.
We offer close collaboration with the Career Center to specify what unique Arabic-language certifications and skills can help you prepare for the following post-grad tracks, as well as what funding Swarthmore can help you obtain:
- Graduate school research - successfully applying to Arabic-language research grants and fellowships, writing senior honors theses, digital humanities training for the Arabic script, trainings in library/information science (such as the Lib/Lab fellowship and Library Internship and Careers in Library and Information Science (CiLIS) workshop)
- K-12 and Higher Ed language instruction - preparing for educational certification (such as the Praxis Exam for world languages pedagogy), language certification (such as the ACTFL via Language Testing International)
- Government & Nonprofit - successfully applying to Arabic-language-affiliated internships, mixed-method trainings (such as the Swarthmore UX internship), translation certifications (such as the PA Interpreter certification, the American Translators Association's certification, or the United Nations Competitive Examinations for Language Positions)
- Domestic and international law - preparing for expert witness certification (such as the Certified Forensic Litigation Consultant (CFLC) and Master Certified Forensic Litigation Consultant (MCFLC) certifications), training in legal Arabic (such as the online "Global Certificate Course in Legal Arabic for Legal Practice")
- Computer Science & Data Analytics - engaging in computational projects dealing with Optical Character Recognition (OCR), Handwritten Text Recognition (HTR) and Natural Language Processing (NLP) for the Arabic script
- International Business - preparing for technical language certifications, including accounting (such as the FMAA Certification in Arabic) and business Arabic (such as the Moroccan Business Arabic Language Program)
