(*) Heidi asked for her surname and photo not to be published
The first time I met Alissa was in October 2017, a few weeks before she embarked on her one-year Rotary Youth Exchange to Minnesota, USA. At the time, she was a High School student at Emmanuel College; ernest, and – dare I say? - somewhat shy. There is a record of that meeting with a photo on our website: click here. You’ll find quite a number of other articles as well – simply click on the Search button (very top, right) for ‘Alissa’.Fast forward 4 ½ years. Yes, she is still Alissa, but today I can only describe her as a superbly confident, well-spoken young woman. Studying for a Bachelor of Advanced Humanities at UQ, her future professional field can be… well, anything that deals with… humanity: Diplomatic Service, Sociologist, Editor, Policy Advisor, just to name a few. Brimming with confidence hardly describes her. “The experiences I had there made me a different person,” she said. From several examples, I selected just one. She found that her passport was soaked in Grapefruit juice. Many people would simply panic. “I was calm and collected and established the process to fix it and then fixed it”.
To supplement her studies (and to earn some income), Alissa works at QBD, the large bookshop chain. She also does journalism, interviewing singers and artists and publishes them on Social Media. She is involved in Music Videos, Community Radio, working with children from Immigrant backgrounds.
Heidi, our second speaker, attended the recent RYLA (Rotary Youth Leadership Award) camp. Over the years, we have enjoyed the presentations of numerous young people coming out of RYLA, brimming with enthusiasm after being immersed in a week of motivational speakers and “highly switched-on” people. Heidi, however, added a new one: “I am in some sort of ‘University Bubble’. RYLA for me was a week-long toolkit, helping me to find purpose” she said. Heidi also was, as far as I can recall, the only one who gave serious thought to how RYLA could be improved: “Be more sensitive to past experiences of attendees” was the major one. “Earlier bedtimes”. Hmmm… with a group of about 40 young, highly motivated people – this might be a tad more difficult to achieve!
Check out the speaker’s PowerPoint presentations in the Download Section on the right (in PDF format).
(Photo: Alissa with Meeting Chairman of the day Simon Brook)