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| Jessica Campbell BA Business |
Red Pine Camp for Girls, as Lead Sailing Instructor and Cabin Counsellor in Wisconsin, America.
While at UWS…..
I was UWS Vice President for Crichton University Campus Student Association (CUCSA) in first year and started the university sailing club. Second year I grew the sailing club with more training days. Third year I took advantage of funding from CUCSA to get my Dinghy Instructor qualification which allowed us to move the sailing club to a more suitable location. This also enabled me to apply for summer work with sailing as the main aspect of the job description.
As Captain of the sailing club I got to take advantage of networking with other universities within Scotland to organise combined events and enter UWS Dumfries into the Scottish sailing programme.
I also took advantage of the expertise of staff with ideas and techniques on both the setting up and running of the sailing club but also applying for summer jobs with references.
My journey…..
I thought that I would not be experienced enough in first year to go straight into Vice President for the Student Union.
For sailing summer jobs I felt I would have too much competition and my experience of volunteering would not be enough to get a great job worth giving up my summer for.
However I had a lot of guidance and support from my lectures giving me confidence to try these. They put pressure on me (in a nice way) to apply for Vice back in first year saying I would be ‘great to stand up and change it’ and they gave examples of how I had already started to do this.
How I have benefited…
I have become much more independent and confident. I am writing this surrounded by strangers and I am not worried or scared because of this added independence I have gained from these experiences earlier on.
My advice to students…
Get involved with one or two of the clubs within the university. They are small, friendly and if there is not one you like, start one!
Published courtesy of UWS Careers Service http://www.uws.ac.uk/careers/
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