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University of Northern Iowa Student Lands Job Through Competition

Posted on: Friday, 10 March 2006, 15:00 CST

By Emily Christensen, Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier, Iowa

Mar. 8--CEDAR FALLS -- An Apprentice-style competition has landed one University of Northern Iowa senior a job before he even got the opportunity to look.

Tarek Fahmy, a Cedar Falls native majoring in management, was recently offered a job with Wells Fargo Financial Business Management in Des Moines. Fahmy, who is also vice president of the university's student government, was one of four finalist in the Four Hire! competition designed by the Greater Des Moines Partnership's Young Professionals Connection to retain Iowa graduates for Des Moines job opportunities.

"To join a company like that out of college is a huge honor. ... I knew graduating from UNI that I wanted to end up in a bigger city and Des Moines was the logical choice for me," Fahmy said. "It is a perfect fit.

I am very happy I took a chance and put my application in."

The competition started with interviews with representatives from each of the four sponsoring companies. From there, the students were split into three groups of four for their first competition.

Fahmy said the groups had six hours to create a marketing plan for the Change Your View campaign sponsored by the Greater Des Moines Partnership. When time was up each group gave their presentation to the board before the contestants were cut to 8.

The remaining participants returned to Des Moines on Feb. 24 for their final, individual challenge. Each contestant was asked to develop a business plan for the new downtown Des Moines public library which will open this spring. Fahmy said he drew the seventh presentation time which gave him precious extra minutes to practice his spiel.

"I had worked very hard on my ideas, but I never got the chance to practice my presentation," he said. "Those extra minutes allowed me the opportunity to step out of the holding room for awhile and walk the halls while I practiced my presentation."

After waiting more than a week for the results Fahmy was one of the lucky four to hear the phrase "You're hired." Fahmy will start at Wells Fargo as an outbound sales specialist.

Jenna Woline, a Young Professionals Connection member, said the organization hopes to help all 12 contestants find jobs in Des Moines before they graduate. If all goes according to plan the competition will be back next year. Each of this year's four sponsoring companies --- Wells Fargo, the Des Moines Register, Allied Insurance and Principal Financial --- will have the opportunity to participate again.

"We have received many compliments from the community and our sponsors.

They were all very impressed with the quality of the candidates," Woline said.

A film crew from Mediacom Communications followed contestants and is producing a series of programs documenting the competition. The first segment will air statewide on the Connections Channel tonight at 9 p.m.

Fahmy is the son of Mohammed and Bahia Fahmy of Cedar Falls.

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To see more of the Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.wcfcourier.com.

Copyright (c) 2006, Waterloo-Cedar Falls Courier, Iowa

Distributed by Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News.

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WFC,

Source: Waterloo Courier

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