gesture

early career program

what is the gesture Program?

gesture reimagines what college and career preparation can be. Change isn’t optional, it’s already here. As the landscape shifts, gesture offers a new approach to preparing for the future of both college and work.

This four-year intellectual and professional experience combines hands-on internships, academic innovation, and AI training to create a radically new model. Students move through a connected sequence of academic and real-world experiences built around our core pillars: mission, challenge, and story.

Unlike traditional programs, gesture places foundational emphasis on AI fluency for non-technical students because in this new world of work, it’s fluency, not mastery, that will define adaptability and employability.

How does it work?

1) A standalone start-up within which students will gain work experience as interns.

2) A new learning model of self-directed intellectual growth and mentorship.

3) Explicit focus on creating AI generalists to prepare our students for the real world of work.

gesture students leave with more than a degree. They leave with professional experience, digital fluency, and a strong support network.

Ready to explore gesture?

Watch or listen: Our podcast, UNHIREABLE, on YouTube and Spotify!

Want to get involved? To hear about opportunities, updates, and how to join the program, sign up on our stay in touch form and choose “gesture Program” as your topic of interest.

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How we got here

For more than a decade, we have been working with employers to understand how Arts and Sciences graduates can be more successful in early career. The hard truth they tell us is that very few of our students are actually prepared for the world of work. While the reasons are complex, the bottom line is that the mindset that works in school does not help in the real world. In fact, it hinders early career success.

We want students to do well in school. But if school is the only skill you have, student is the only job you are qualified to do. gesture helps students change their mindset through story.

gesture is built around three core concepts:

Mission

School is about solving your own problems – homework, exams, and requirements. But the people who make a difference are the ones who solve other peoples’ problems, not their own. We help students build a mission mindset: a focus on creating value for other people.

Challenge

College should be about challenge. Instead, it has come to insulate many students from failure and discomfort. But challenge drives growth. In gesture, we do not avoid failure; we seek it out, to build resilience for the failures that inevitably occur in real work. Early career success means seeking real challenge on your own, not waiting for the teacher to give you an assignment.

Story

Everyone talks about storytelling, but telling is the least important part of story. At gesture, story is more about listening than talking. Story is how we understand and connect people, ideas, and communities. Story is the tool we use to change our mindset, and solve problems for other people.

More gesture!

UNHIREABLE | AI and Early Career: Are universities ready?

AI is changing the early career landscape fast and gesture is ready for it. In this episode of UNHIREABLE, we discuss gesture's recent pivot toward AI and its developing impact on education and early career development. Kevin emphasizes AI’s growing relevance to students' future careers and its alignment with gesture's mission-focused approach. The team discusses the challenges of preparing students for a rapidly changing AI landscape.