Alecia Bencze has a unique perspective on Symplicity CSM — she used it as a law student before spending the last decade as Director of Career Services and Strategic Initiatives at the University of Akron School of Law. With 13 years of experience on both sides of the platform, she's seen firsthand how it's evolved and why it remains central to her office's work.
For Akron Law, CSM isn't just a job board — it's the connective tissue of the student experience. The office uses Pathways extensively, with customized tracks for each of their three classes, a dedicated pathway for spring-entering students, and a recently added interviewing pathway that has become a standout resource.
"Students have been very excited about the interviewing pathway," Bencze said. "It's not that these things don't exist in other places, but having them all in one location makes it feel revolutionary."
The platform also powers the school's pro bono program, which requires students to log 30 hours across a variety of categories. This year, the office tracked 181 students through the system — up from a typical cohort of 120 — making organized record-keeping more critical than ever.
The impact shows up in real moments. Bencze recalled a student who came in preparing for an interview with the NAACP in DC, nervous about how to speak to mission-driven work after recruiting primarily at firms. "I said, do I have the place for you — this interviewing pathway is going to have everything you need."
The office also leans on the CSM mobile app as a student engagement tool — even posting a sign at the front counter encouraging students to use it. While Bencze herself handles everything from the browser, her admin and her boss have found the app significantly more intuitive for students. One practical benefit: the system shows whether students are logging in via mobile or desktop, giving the office visibility into how and when students are engaging with the platform.
"Apparently it's much more user friendly," Bencze said. "And it actually tells you who's logged in on mobile and who's logged in on a computer."
Resume review is another area where CSM earns its place in the daily workflow. Every student's first resume upload requires Bencze's approval before they can apply to anything through the system — a built-in quality control step that ensures no student goes out with a subpar document.
"The students will try to apply to something or put it in the system, and then I have to go in and check it," she said. It's a simple feature, but one that reflects how CSM supports the office's hands-on, high-touch advising model.
One feature Bencze and her team particularly value is the ability to send communications that look like they're coming directly from the law school — not from a third-party platform. Some products send emails that arrive visibly branded with the vendor's name, causing some students to immediately delete the communications. Bencze reflected on how different that experience is with Symplicity, which is fully customizable for the user.
"Our students have no idea," she said. "If I'm sending that email or Symplicity is sending that email — they can't tell. That's huge."
When asked what she'd tell a school considering the switch, Bencze didn't hesitate: it comes down to support.
"When I need an answer, I cannot submit a ticket and wait. If I'm calling, it's an immediate problem." With ten years of experience and a boss who's been in the field for fifteen, Bencze says her team sometimes works their way into situations they can't easily get out of — a broken OCI setup, a feature behaving unexpectedly. Every time, Symplicity support has been able to get them back on track fast.
"Almost immediately, the person would say, here's the answer, here's what we need to do — and we're back up and running. The tech support, being able to speak to a person who can look at the system on the same side as you, is to me incredibly invaluable."
Bencze and her team are eyeing Symplicity's mock interview feature as their next area to explore, after hearing positive feedback from peer institutions. With the platform already handling pathways, pro bono logging, resume approvals, and a new professionalism requirement, the goal is to keep building on a foundation that already works.
"It kind of encapsulates a lot of things in one clean, easy-to-use place," Bencze said. "It helps us be outwardly organized to our students."