Amanda Cornwall joined CAPD this spring.

Career Advising & Professional Development (CAPD) officially launched graduate student professional development services in the spring with the hire of Amanda Cornwall, PhD, filling the newly created title of associate director of graduate student professional development. Amanda’s arrival is part of a new investment in staff and resources that will bring centralized services to the Institute to support graduate student professional development needs.

Amanda has a PhD in comparative literature from the University of Oregon, an MA in writing and publishing from Emerson College, and a BA in English from Willamette University. Before coming to MIT, she worked with graduate students on their career and professional development at Northeastern and at UCLA.

“Professional development programs for graduate students present an opportunity to amplify the impact of graduate training so that students are poised to contribute their skills and talents in versatile, transformative ways and rise to positions of leadership and influence,” Amanda stated. “We can think of MIT’s professional development competencies as tools that can augment the already remarkable abilities of MIT graduate students — adding on the superpowers of leadership, communication, teaching and mentoring, and more. I am thrilled to be joining the CAPD team and I think MIT is the most exciting place to be.” She is currently meeting with partners around the Institute and building up professional development operations to be ready for fall 2021.

When considering her vision for CAPD’s professional development offerings, Amanda added, “I envision a cohesive, integrated professional development model for MIT that will unify and enhance existing work in this area at the Institute, offering a suite of opportunities tailored especially for graduate students that facilitate connections between many facets of the MIT ecosystem.”

— Lydia Huth, Deborah Liverman, and Amanda Cornwall, CAPD