I applied for the University’s internship in the Spring of 2022. At first, I did not expect too much on my application. But after I received an invitation to attend an interview, I began to take it seriously, because this is going to be a unique learning experience. I started preparing for the interview and eventually received the offer, working as a member of the Engagement and Conversion Team in the External Relations Department.
My name is Ji and I am currently a fourth year undergraduate student studying Mathematics. In May 2022 I was offered an opportunity to become a member of the Engagement and Conversion Team, which oversees engaging with our future students. My job was to compare their work with the work of other universities’ engagement teams.
I was a bit nervous about the role since I was not confident about my communication skills. More importantly I had no idea about the British higher education system before.
After joining the team, I learned about my duties. In the first week my manager introduced me to other team members, I got some knowledge about what their duties are, and my job was more like an extension to their work.
My job can be categorized into 5 directions: research into other universities’ enquiry systems, analysing their webpages, investigating their engagement system, and completing some statistics to their data on social media platforms.
My research targets included 16 universities: 6 from Scotland, 6 from England and 4 overseas.
The internship lasted for 10 weeks. At the end of the job, I needed to put everything I researched into a final report and submit it to my manager.
This internship helped me developed my communication skills, and also I had a unique experience with British office culture. I also developed my research skills and gained knowledge about British universities.
Learning through the internship was a great opportunity, and I would highly recommended this to my fellow mates in the University. if you are undertaking some projects but not sure about general skills, an internship would be a great option for personal development.
