Month: August 2023

Categories
Careers programmes Global Opportunities student success Student success stories Think Pacific

My Think Pacific Internship Experience in Fiji

Image of the house built by the Think Pacific Project

Every year, Queen’s Global Opportunities offer students the chance to participate in The Think Pacific programme. They have a chance to tackle global issues and achieve real outcomes for our partners in Fiji. Chelsie Haddock was among the successful applicants to the programme. Chelsie took part in the Think Pacific Programme spending a month working on a community build in Namau, Fiji. Here is her experience:

Sota tale Fiji! (See you again, Fiji!)

Chelsie with other members of the Think Pacific Group

This was the most unforgettable experience with the most amazing people. Throughout the month of June, I was grateful enough to work alongside volunteers from the Think Pacific Programme as well as the Fijian youth of Namau to build and produce a health dispensary within the village of Namau.

Workers on site of the health dispensary in Namau
Construction of the health dispensary in Namau

During this time, I was also welcomed into a wonderful family who I am now blessed to call my own. This experience was truly a once in a lifetime blessing. I fully embraced the Fijian culture and loved every second of the culture classes that we also took part in. This included, trying new foods and learning how to cook some of the traditional meals. I built rafts, attended church services and learned Fijian songs. I learned about the history of Fiji and the village of Namau. I also performed traditional dances, ‘mekes’ which was my favourite part as we performed them as a family.

This adventure has been so surreal, all thanks to the village of Namau, who warmly welcomed us into their village and treated us as their own from the very start. Your culture and stories will never be forgotten, and I cannot wait to go back in the future!

Vinaka vaka levu Fiji.(Thank you very much Fiji)

Find out more about Think Pacific.

Categories
Global Opportunities international students student success Working Globally in NI

Working Globally from NI: My Intern Experience at Mourne Dew Distillery

Engineer working at a distillery

Electrical and Electronic Engineering student Vihan Fonseka spent four weeks at Mourne Dew Distillery as part of our Working Globally from NI programme. Read his experience below.

Going outside my comfort zone

I started my International Marketing Assistant with Mourne Dew Distillery just a week after my final year exams ended. I was very excited from the start as this experience would be outside my comfort zone and a whole new domain for me coming from an engineering background. This opportunity would be put in a place where I can expand and learn new skills and broaden my perspective.

Learning about the company

My interest for Mourne Dew began when I came across the internship posting where I was impressed to learn about their story from starting very small to now producing award winning Whiskies, Gins, Vodkas and Poitins. The craftmanship involved in producing these spirits further attracted me to apply as I learned about how Mourne Dew infuses the essence of the famous Mourne Mountains into their products as well as various botanicals. From a perspective of an international student and someone who doesn’t drink alcohol, I found the craftmanship, dedicate and innovation that goes into making these products very interesting and something I would like to be a part of.

Leading my own projects

My internship at Mourne Dew consisted of various projects that I led and delivered. From conducting research into revamping the current booking system through analysing suitable software to collecting and compiling business tenders to sell the byproduct of the production being hand sanitizers I was exposed to different functions of the business from Day 1. Mourne Dew is still a growing business, and I partook in their expansion efforts through conducing market research into the spirit markets of USA, Poland and Germany, I was able to learn about different spirit products, various pricing methods, ingredient mix and generally what whisky or gin or vodka is popular in different regions.

Hybrid working

In addition to working remotely, I was able to visit the distillery in Warrenpoint and meet the team behind it. Neil Flemming (Sales Manager) had kindly picked me up and brought me to the distillery plant. It was interesting to see the production process of creating high quality Whisky, Gin, Vodka and Poitin as Eimear and Donal (Operations Assistant) gave me a breakdown of the distillation process, packaging and was impressed that the entire batch is made by hand. I had also got a sniff of the different experimental botanical mixtures that Donal (owner) had been testing from seaweed to citrus and they all smelled incredible.

Overall, working at Mourne Dew for the past 4 weeks had been an incredible experience that helped me step into a totally different domain, learning about marketing, sales and generally how a distillery is run.

Find out more about Working Globally from NI here.

Categories
advice Career planning consultants consultations

Meet our Career Consultants: Carmel Colton

Careers Consultant Carmel speaking with a student
Carmel Colton

My name is Carmel and I’m a Career Consultant working within the Careers, Employability and Skills team here at Queen’s.

A Career Consultant provides impartial and confidential career information, advice and guidance

We do this through 30 minute one-to-one career consultations.

These can be done either online or face-to-face in the new One Elmwood Student Centre.

There is a Career Consultant aligned to each school in the university, so you’ll often see us out and about in your classes,

supporting the delivery of careers and employability within the curriculum.

The career consultation is perhaps very different from what you have previously experienced within the school system, as you take a more active role in the process.

You will be able to consider your next step and put a plan in place to move forward.

There are many benefits to engaging with a Career Consultant, regardless if you know

exactly what you want to do, have absolutely no idea what you want to do, or maybe somewhere in between.

Making a career decision can often be overwhelming and confusing.

The best part of my job is that every day is different.

It aligns with my personal values of helping and supporting others

and making a positive contribution to those around me.

The worst part of my job is seeing students that are overwhelmed and anxious about their career prospects, while the best part is supporting those students to recognise their own potential, to build their confidence and to reach their aspirations.