Students open Career Closet to provide free professional attire
Fourth-year bioengineering student Haixing Kehoe searched for formal wear at the Career Closet at UCLA for graduate school interviews. (Austin Yu/Daily Bruin senior staff)
By Sujung Hahn
April 1, 2015 8:05 a.m.
A group of UCLA students opened a free closet Tuesday providing professional and formal attire for students to wear to interviews, career fairs and networking events.
Career Closet at UCLA, located at the University Religious Conference near the corner of Hilgard and Le Conte avenues, will open every Tuesday from 5 to 7 p.m. Gathered from ongoing clothing donations from community members, faculty and alumni, the formal-wear collection will be available to all students who show up with a BruinCard.
Career Closet workers and volunteers have been gathering the clothing donations and the money for the racks since January, said Meelaud Daneshvar, co-founder of Career Closet and a fourth-year psychology student.
Each student is allowed four articles of clothing per year that are theirs to keep, said Amir Hakimi, co-founder of Career Closet and a fourth-year neuroscience student. If students return any items, those won’t count toward the four articles, he added.
Hakimi said he launched the project after a discussion last year with UCLA Dean of Students Maria Blandizzi in which she said many students don’t have formal wear, which holds them back from applying for jobs or to graduate schools.
“I feel that all students deserve to aim for jobs or higher education,” Hakimi said. “Business attire is such an important factor when it comes to having the confidence to succeed in any kind of professional interviews.”
Daneshvaer said he wants the Career Closet project to become a useful resource for all students at UCLA.
“I thought Career Closet is a good way to help those in need since there’s a large population of students on campus who cannot afford professional attire,” Daneshvar said. “They should feel comfortable getting the clothes they need for any situation and to not be judged.”
Hakimi said to create the service, he, Daneshvar and a group of volunteers reached out to the James West Alumni Center last month to get donations, applied for funding grants to pay for clothing racks and spread the word through social media.
Daneshvar said it cost between $150 and $200 to buy and construct the clothing racks needed for Career Closet.
Second-year cognitive science student Alana Sanchez-Prak, who came to the Career Closet’s launch on Tuesday, said she went because she wanted to join business organizations but had no formal outfits.
“Career Closet is a great idea to me since I and others I know mostly didn’t know where to start when shopping for these kinds of outfits,” Sanchez-Prak said. “For the most part formal attire is very expensive, so I think Career Closet should help me and other students get a feel for how we should shop for professional clothes.”
Fourth-year bioengineering student Haixing Kehoe went to Career Closet’s opening night to browse for formal clothing that may suit her own special occasions.
Kehoe said she became interested because she wanted to pick up formal outfits for visiting graduate schools interviews.
Hakimi said the Career Closet may soon extend its opening hours beyond one day a week depending on student demand for professional attire.
Contributing reports by Ian Stevenson, Bruin contributor.
