Northeastern University’s biannual career fair is the quintessential hot spot for young jobseekers looking to find the perfect professional match.

Just ask any one of the 3,000 students or alumni who filled the Cabot Center on Thursday afternoon for the Spring 2016 Career Fair, which was sponsored by Department of Cooperative Education and Career Development.

“It’s a really promising situation to be in,” explained Chaitanya Obulareddy, ME’16, who is pursuing a full-time job in data analysis. “You can get all your questions answered in one place, without having to spend hours on the Internet emailing recruiters and waiting for a response that might never come.”

Obulareddy and his peers spent the day handing out resumés, honing their net­working skills, and exchanging busi­ness cards with more than 270 employers, including several nonprofit and government agencies.

There was Bullhorn, the recruiting software firm, and WGBH, the public radio station. There was Isobar, the digital marketing company, and NewBotic, the robotic systems integrator.

The power of co-op

Many of the employer rep­re­sen­ta­tives who attended the fair praised Northeastern’s co-​​​​op pro­gram for preparing students for the working world. During the 2014-2015 academic year, the university placed students in more than 10,300 co-op positions with more than 3,100 employers worldwide.

Kelsey Edelstein is an associate accountant at Prager Metis, the public accounting firm. She noted that the company has hired four former co-op students to work there full-time, saying that they’re confident and particularly ambitious.

“They’re ready to handle anything, whether it’s a small task or a complex project,” she said. “They’re inclined to do research on their own and confident enough to talk to the firm’s partners.”

Brian Grover, the sales development manager at EiQ Networks, the cybersecurity firm, agreed. As he put it, “They have an entrepreneurial spirit and a hunger to be successful.”

Alex Walecki, SSH’16, is a prime example. Fresh off a co-op for Development Counsellors International, the place marketing firm, the fifth-year economics and international affairs combined major strode into the Cabot Cage looking for his first full-time job.

“It’s full steam ahead,” he said, noting that he was particularly interested in speaking with the employer representative for FTI Consulting, the global business advisory firm. “I’m trying to get a consulting job, and there’s no reason why I wouldn’t come to an event like this.”