LinkedIn university pages aim to help students decide where to study

TORONTO – LinkedIn is expanding its audience from top executives, to high school students.

The professional social networking site’s new ‘university pages’ are geared towards teenagers who are deciding where to attend university.

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Teens will be able to look up information about courses and notable alumni, explore universities in other countries, and even invite users in their field of interest to connect to learn more about their future career choice.

“For the past few years, I’d watched my daughter and her friends struggle with these choices. For the most part, they were flying blind,” said Christina Allen, director of product management at LinkedIn, in a blog post on the company’s website.

“Some knew what they wanted to study – but had no visibility into the career options that would result. Others had a career in mind, like my daughter, but little idea which school would best help them get there.”

Some 200 universities around the world have already started pages, including Canadian institutions like University of Toronto, University of Waterloo and the University of British Columbia and notable U.S.-based campuses like New York University, and the University of California San Diego.

According to the LinkedIn blog post, students will benefit from using the online-resume service by building a network of alumni and professional mentors.

“Through my relationships at LinkedIn, I knew that hidden in millions of member profiles were powerful insights about the career outcomes of educations from universities around the world,” said Allen.

“If harnessed, these insights could provide incredible value for students – helping them explore possible futures and build a support network to help them succeed on campus and beyond.”

The social network has also adjusted its minimum age restriction to 14 years old for Canadian users so that high school students may take advantage of the service.