Life Experience

It’s that time of year again! OLC staff member Terae Walters reminisces on past school years and tells us about her tips for sailing through the first year.

Behind every career is a story with its own victories and challenges. OLC staff member Terae tells her story to us and goes into why being in a creative field as a woman has its own unique problems and how she found strategies to overcome them.

Now that SFU is reopening, many of you may be excited to kickstart your social life again! We want you to feel confident about how to get involved, make friends and feel fulfilled - in clubs, peer leadership, volunteer, jobs or work.

Co-op can be an exciting, rewarding, and terrifying experience. Sometimes, we wish we could tell things to our past self, get advice from our future self or just reflect on how far we've come. In this blog, Katie writes letters to her past, present, and future selves about her co-op journey and the progress she's made. 

Throughout this past year, I got to try out a variety of roles working in completely different industries. While all of my positions were marketing-related, each of them tackled a different aspect of digital marketing, challenging me to grow personally and professionally. In this article, I describe my entire Co-op journey and the things I learned along the way. 

What's the first thing that comes to mind when you think of the perfect job sector for a Communication student? Social media? Probably. Marketing? Most definitely. Healthcare? Read about Erica's experience jumping into a job at Vancouver Coastal Health - during a pandemic no less!

Over Bill's five terms of Co-op experience, the past two (in Summer and Fall 2020) have provided a rather unique experience. In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, Bill was given the opportunity to work remotely from home and found himself needing to adapt to a very different work environment in terms of task planning and time management. In this blog, Bill hopes to share some of these experiences as well as some challenges that he faced while working remotely

Kandice, a Public Health Graduate student, never expected to be a Teaching Assistant (TA). But with the encouragement from family and friends who were former TAs, Kandice took the plunge. Now as her first year comes to a close, Kandice shares some helpful tips on how to have an enjoyable semester as a TA!

Deriving inspiration from her first post, "4 Reasons You Won't Regret Working in Customer Service", Sydney is back and ready to share more knowledge with you from her time in retail. In this article, you'll find Sydney's strategy for negotiating wage raises, work-term extensions and permanent positions. 

After spending 5 years in retail, Sydney was ready to pursue a career related to her studies. Looking back, although there were trials and tribulations, her time in customer service was a spectacular triumph as she developed new ways of communicating, leadership skills, and other attributes that have propelled her professional and personal development. 

Not many people know about all the perks of being an SFU student, such as huge discounts, free access to normally paid services, and cheaper subscriptions to popular products. Here is a list of everything you can take advantage of as an SFU student!

2020 has been an unprecedented and extraordinary year. What we at the OLC have been pleasantly surprised by is how inspiring our contributing authors have been. Many of our posts touched on the reality of the pandemic, but they were written from a place of positivity and resilience. To wrap up 2020 at the SFU OLC, we've curated our top 12 inspiring posts and summarized how they can continue to inspire you in the New Year.

Like any other person, we have all thought about death at least once in our lives. Join Paneet in this honest conversation about end-of-life issues and what to do when such a tragic but inevitable discussion arises amongst loved ones. In this article, Paneet provides helpful advice and carefully selected resources to ease in to the conversation and to help prepare for the unpredictability of life.

The pandemic has made online dating a more popular way of meeting new people. While online dating is a great way to e-meet new people, you might also find yourself in potentially uncomfortable situations with strangers. Read on to learn more about which red flags the Health Peers recommend keeping a keen eye out.

TW has been hearing this line over and over for a large part of her life. For the most part, she didn't know how to manage her ADHD symptoms, mostly because she didn't know she had ADHD. Read on to learn more about TW's journey and why going to SFU Health & Counselling was life-changing.

Diana Smith pens a series of poignant and moving letters addressed to her chronic pain. A must-read to better understand from a personal perspective what it is like to live with chronic pain.

JenJen was not quite expecting to be advising fellow SFU students as a Student Academic Advisor from the comfort of her home as her very first co-op experience. Read on to learn more on how she found her stride in getting used to a new work environment as a new co-op student in unusual circumstances.

A student desperately wanting to have class outside suggested we put the decision to a vote. An overwhelming amount of hands went up for having class in the sun and I paused to think about how I could adjust my lesson plan without a chalkboard. The students saw my hesitation and said, “but Claire, don’t you believe in our right to have a democracy?”. This was when I knew I would learn a lot more than just how to teach, from my international co-op term in Catalonia.

Considering a co-op outside of BC? Jenny shares 4 tips on moving to a new city based on her experience relocating to Ontario’s capital city, the 6ix.

Like most soon-to-be graduates, Keeley was looking forward kick-start her career. And what better way to do it than to start looking for industry-applicable experience? But when COVID-19 hit, plans had to change. Read on to find out how Keeley overcame a saturated job market in the middle of a pandemic. 

Have you ever considered travelling alone? Does it make your nervous? Well, you are not alone. There are many benefits to travelling alone and what better way to experience another country and culture than through a short-term International Co-op term? Read on to learn some tips & tricks when travelling alone.

In my first semester, I had no idea what type of co-op position I was looking for. This was somewhat stressful, but what helped was keeping an open mind to a range of positions, and taking a chance!

For three years I worked part-time at TD Canada Trust as a customer service representative and eventually a personal banking associate.

Taking steps to prioritize your financial wellness can set you up for better overall wellness.

Are you thinking of studying in Canada? Are you about to arrive or have recently landed? Make the most of your experience with these tips for studying abroad.

"When you work at a start-up, literally anything can happen." Anmol takes us into a world where content is born out of chaos, and the landscape is dynamic, creative and challenging.  Becoming an integral part of a new company and seeing your creations make an impact can be one of the most rewarding experiences.  

Do you look into the future and see a thousand different paths after graduation? Juliette reflects on her time at Careers in Communications and reveals the benefits of figuring out what you hate before deciding what you love.  

Attending a Conference can be a remarkable experience- that is if you plan to make it that way.  Ali shares six tips to prepare for a conference so you can make sure it’s worth your while.