FASS Internships and Placements team have gathered a panel of six students from the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences to celebrate the variety of different work experience they have undertaken in the past year.
All six students study different subjects and are in different stages of their academic life, so we had a good representation of departments and year groups, and all had unique and genuinely inspiring stories. As Dr Isabelle Baron said on the night, it’s reassuring and uplifting to hear so many of our students interested in social change and working with grassroots community groups!
Here’s a quick snapshot of our speakers:
| Student Speakers | Department | Degree | Year |
| Phoebe Hanson | PPR | Politics | 1 |
| Helen Fairs | DeLC | BA Hons French Studies & Linguistics | 3 |
| Ruth Walbank | English Lit & Creative Writing | MA Student in Literary Studies | 1 |
| Núria Rovira Terradas | LICA | BA Hons Fine Art | Graduated |
| Domonique West | Law | LLB Hons Law | 2 |
| Jessica Priest | Linguistics | BA Hons English Language & Linguistics (with Placement Year) | 3 |
Our Panel:
Jessica Priest – Jessica is currently on a Placement year with Walgreens Boots Alliance (better knows as Boots) as a Business Development Executive. Studying English Language and Linguistics she wanted to do a business placement to see if she likes the corporate environment. Regarding the application process, Jessica told us not be put away from applying if your degree isn’t from a corporate background.
Boots a very known to us brand is split into global brands and retail sides. Jessica sits in the global brands section, in the development team. In her role she manages partnership with different start-ups, retailers, brands, and companies all over the world. Typical day could involve calls with current and potential partners and meetings with other boots teams, such as a legal team. She really liked working for such a large corporation, because she got an opportunity to learn so much about global aspect, supply chain, customer service centre, ecommerce and product development testing.
Jessica told us that at first it was tricky to adjust to the workplace, however now she is very confident in what she is doing. She enjoyed all of the experiences which were on offer to her in Boots. Most importantly she developed new skills and learned more about what motivates her the most.
Phoebe Hanson – Phoebe is a 1st year Politics Student, who worked as an Event Coordinator for a youth climate conference Mock Cop26. This conference brings world leaders to create a discussion on climate crisis, it’s impacts and ways which we can mitigate it. She was a part of the group of young people which managed to bring over 800 people over 140 countries and to secure over a 100 thousand pounds in funding to make their idea into a reality.
Phoebe was leading a communication team, which meant managing a group of volunteers, she was overseeing the outreach to media outlets. Coordinated a partnership with BBC and The Guardian. She worked alongside some of the PR professionals to learn on how to best promote the event. She also gathered a lot of experience of communicating with people who had a basic knowledge of English language.
Mock Cop26 was most valuable experience she ever had, a great opportunity to network with major charities, and politicians. This experience taught her that she possesses a valuable set of experiences and skills, which gives her a unique perspective on different topics. As Phoebe highlighted a power of throwing yourself out there unapologetically is very important. She also shared with us that since the age of 17 she has been rejected from about 80% of her applications. However, that didn’t stop her to apply for all the opportunities and gain very invaluable experience in the charity sector.
Ruth Walbank – Ruth is an English Literary Studies MA, who had an internship at the Copify copywriting company as a Content Delivery Manager. Copify is a professional writing company which creates nonfiction pieces for clients, which can range from blogs to product descriptions.
Working virtually, she delivered content to the client on deadline and which is consistent with the brief which they have sent. A typical day would mean around 10 orders which need to be fulfilled, often ranging in size from 50 words to 4000 words. Since July Ruth has written over 400 orders which means 20000 words! But, aside from writing this job also involves research into new topics and proof reading of other writers. She learned to switch between different styles of English Language as she had to write for different English-speaking countries.
Ruth has also mentioned that she is dyslexic, however that didn’t stop her from being a great writer that she is! Through practice she got better and better at writing. At this role she learned to balance quantity of work with quality, make it very understandable, yet effective to the readers. At the end Ruth mentioned that university career services and her role as a SCAN editor helped her out to secure this role.
Domonique West – Domonique is a 2nd year Law student, who had work experience shadowing several solicitors at criminal defence firm and barristers from Deans Court Chambers. She managed to secure this work experience in summer prior to starting her university degree. Since opportunities were limited, she decided to send out emails to all solicitors in Manchester.
Burton Copeland Criminal Defence Solicitors invited her to give her an insight. In there she shadowed a solicitor who at that time was working with a client. Dominique was given all the case files, an insight into the case nature and even an opportunity to sit on an interview with a client. Then with a head of the firm she went to the Magistrates’ Court, which was an exciting day out for her. Also, it helped her to apply her current knowledge into a real-life court seating. Due to her interest the head of the firm gave her an opportunity to gain an insight into a role of a barrister.
Just like Phoebe, Dominique has also mentioned the importance of putting yourself out there. This experience helped Dominique to see how her knowledge is applied into the real world. Dominique hasn’t yet completed her degree, however because of this experience she already knows that she wants to follow a solicitor career route.
Helen Fairs – Helen is a Final year French and Linguistics student, who volunteered during COVID-19 with the food charity Eggcup and with the refugee charity City of Sanctuary.
Eggcup is a charity based in Lancaster, which stops surplus food to go to waste. Helen volunteered for 4 days a week through out the summer and over Christmas. She is very passionate about the food waste and local projects, which motivated her to join. She carried task of preparing food orders and setting up the shop stands. She also learned about food waste management, food sustainability, law surrounding it and gained an insight to a running of the charity.
The City of Sanctuary charity provides support for local asylum seekers and refugees. She taught English beginner classes for adults and younger people. She also did one on one teaching, which has also helped her to learn some Spanish. From this experience she learned how to communicate with people who don’t speak very well in English.
Núria Rovira Terradas – Nuria is a Fine Art Graduate who was a Social Media Intern & Assistant Curator with a local event management company and art gallery.
The Deco Publique internship she secured a year ago through the Target Connect. Along this internship she also worked as a freelance which gave her a range of different experiences. During the pandemic period she managed social media, which was a very important role as that was the only way Deco Publique could stay in contact with the public. Managing social media improved her writing skills, she learned how to create digital artwork and graphic design skills. Despite this experience being mostly online, Nuria has really enjoyed it.
Nuria was getting to know creative people in Morecambe and they got in contact with the White Elephant Gallery. Gallery was so interested in working with Nuria and her team that they contacted FASS to create an internship for them. Gallery taught them how to set up an exhibition, whilst Nuria helped them to learn how to set up them in an online format.
Nuria also mentioned that rejection is also very valuable and it doesn’t mean it isn’t worth applying. For those who want to work in the creative field Nuria advices you want to be open to meet people and join the community. Artists help each other, it a community rather than a competition. She has also mentioned that doing a mock interview with the career service and previous experience making art work for university societies helped her out.
A Word of Advice
Members of our student panel came up with some advices for students, here is what they have told us:
Jessica Priest: ‘Don’t shy away from a massive corporation’
Phoebe Hanson: ‘Keep putting yourself out there’
Ruth Walbank: ‘Use the career service’
Domonique West: (in regards to getting rejected) ‘What’s the worst that can happen, you don’t get it, but the reward outweighs the risk’
Núria Rovira Terradas: ‘Apply for everything’
Final Words:
Later we followed with a Q&A session where student guests asked our student panel further questions about their work experiences.
Currently we still are in the pandemic, however there are a lot of different work experience opportunities available for you to apply. There is a lot to take away from this discussion, however some of the valuable knowledge which we really want you to take away today is that:
Every experience is valuable, it can teach you new skills, develop your current skills, help you to discover new information or perhaps help you to find a career of your interest. Fear of not knowing what exact career you want, a fear of new environment, of rejection or other personal issues shouldn’t put you back from achieving your goals or finding your dream career!
Written by Edgar Rutkovskis