The Countdown is Almost Over

It feels like just yesterday I was finishing up my application to be an intern for Western Heads East.

Back then, I had an idea of what the role would entail on a basic level: I would report to supervisors with Western Heads East and coordinate with Youth Opportunities Unlimited to manage and complete tasks, as well as oversee my own success and learning outcomes. I was so excited to hopefully get the position; as a London local – and inevitably so, someone who has grown up knowing and admiring the impact of YOU – I felt excited about the opportunity to expand my professional network within an organization that has commended so much of my respect. Also, as someone who has been a volunteer with Western International since Fall 2020, I was excited about branching into new departments and utilizing the skills I had learned already as an International Student Peer Guide to try something new, but still somewhat familiar.

I really wanted to work with Youth Opportunities Unlimited because I care deeply about the wellness of the community that helped raise me. I wanted to be part of something bigger than myself and that contributed to the overall health and wellbeing of vulnerable populations. Career-wise, the nature of the projects using Fiti to do good community work aligns well with my goals to hopefully study medicine and public health.

It just seemed like a good fit.

I think it was, and I think the version of myself from back in Winter 2023 who was applying for the role would be very proud of myself.

Anyways, the last week-or-so of my internship have been jam packed with finalizing projects and celebrating what a productive summer it has been. I was recently in Kingston, Ontario (about 4-4.5 hours away from London… I realize it’s only Canadians that measure distance with time but I don’t know about the kilometers!), and I was there with my boyfriend to help him move apartments. He is an incoming second-year medical student, and in the same way he supports and encourages my ambitions, I wanted to support him too. Although me helping him move wasn’t entirely altruistic… he did buy me dinner.

A summertime salad from the Backyard Patio in Kingston with spring greens, baked pear, balsamic glaze, blue cheese, and a bunch of other goodies!

I may have also gotten additional treats for my efforts, such as ice cream (twice!!!) because little did we know, but in Kingston there was a festival happening! The Princess Street Promenade!

The Princess Street Promenade, a one-day festival that promotes active living and community involvement in the downtown area of Kingston, Ontario.

I have also recently finished my summer course which was a big weight off of my shoulders! I was enrolled in Physiology 2130, which was required for my Biology module. (Fun fact, if you’re a Western University student enrolled in a Biology Major – not honours, minor, etc. – and you don’t feel like taking Bio 2601, you can replace it with Phys 2130 + another upper year Biology course that sounds more interesting!). I’m feeling proud to share that despite being busy with my internship, and also wrapping up some summer research, I managed to secure an A+ in the course.

Speaking of wrapping up research, tomorrow (August 10th), I will be attended a virtual research conference to present my findings for the summer. If you’re curious to know what I’ve been up to research-wise, here is a link to a video essay that I will be sharing at the conference. Don’t laugh at me because my video editing skills need work! (I’m telling myself the content matters more than the watermarks on the stock videos).

I’m thankful for all of the experiences I’ve been offered this summer (and somehow managed to juggle). I’m thankful to everyone at YOU for welcoming me and my ambitious ideas with open arms and I’m thankful to those at Western Heads East for always looking out for me. I am definitely looking forward to a break, where the only thing I have to worry about it continuing to work on my podcast. By the way… did you know I have a podcast?! I don’t talk about it much, but if you find yourself reading all this way – lucky you!

As always, thank you for reading and sharing my journey with me. I hope you enjoyed it as much as I enjoyed making it for you!

Bye for now,

Allison

Alexa, play Work From Home by Fifth Harmony

There has been a lot happening in the past few weeks, and some awesome progress towards the official launch of Fiti at the YOU Made It! café.

Over the past few weeks, I’ve been lucky enough to meet (virtually) and work with the owners of Mistyglen Creamery. I was so impressed and honestly taken aback by their desire to be so deeply involved in the social enterprise and community work aspects of the collaboration to launch Fiti. Not that I doubted their intentions, but I have come to learn that Mistyglen Creamery is much, much more than just the Fiti manufacturer and producer. They are dedicated and deeply passionate about the health of communities and want to contribute more so other micro dairies may one day be able to replicate our model to do good unto their own communities. I am deeply inspired by their work, especially now knowing what it takes to leave long-lasting impacts on the community.

Speaking of which… non-for-profit work is a lot of administrative work. I find myself writing and reading, and then writing some more and reading even more. It’s a lot of meetings, discussions about branding, and figuring out small details which can easily be overlooked if you’re not careful. I knew going into this internship, from my own experiences, that there are a lot of consultations and behind-the-scenes responsibilities involved with event planning, community service, and engagement. But now, I realize how the success of an initiative – however well-intended – really does depend on the diligence, perspectives, and prior experiences of the team.

I’m grateful to be part of a really good one for this reason, and many more.

Anyways, I’ve started to wrap up projects as the end of the internship approaches. I’m hoping to continue this work via another internship or work-study position in the Fall term – so wish me luck with applying please! If successful, I’ll be able to stay with the team and support in any way I’m able through to the finish line; the official launch of Fiti at the café.

Other than that, my only updates are that the crazy train continues – I have quite a few final projects to finish up including some unrelated research and a summer course. Thankfully, given the flexibility of my position and the ability to work from home, I’ve been able to manage well. If there was one silver lining of the pandemic, it was certainly the rise of work-from-home (WFH) life! WFH for the win!!

I feel like I’ve spent this summer well; although hectic at times, I have learned so much from the people who have mentored me. (And, I’ll have lots to write about for graduate and professional school applications!).

All the best from me, readers. I hope you enjoyed reading my blog thus far and I hope you’ve had the chance to read others from the rest of the intern cohort this year. They are all incredible, inspiring, and have amazing stories to share!

Allison

It’s Time for a Tour!

Hi readers! I hope you’re all doing well and enjoying whatever July has brought you. It’s been an interesting week thus far for me; one of the highlights came on Tuesday when I was given the opportunity to visit the Youth Opportunities Unlimited YOU Made It! café and get a tour of operations.

Don’t worry, I took some photos to share!

Photo of the YOU Made It! cafe in downtown London, Ontario.

When I arrived at the cafe, I was greeted by staff and youth and one of the Work-Study students (Fiona) who I’ve been working alongside since early June. It was my first time meeting with them in person! Post-pandemic, it always feels very special to meet people in person for the first time. This time was no exception.

The café itself is beautiful. The building is old in a classic way where both the inside, and parts of the inside, still feel like London from the 1950s. There is a lot of history in the area of downtown where the cafe is located, and it certainly shines through here! I think it’s always a beautiful thing when home and business owner embrace the old parts of a historic building and allow its natural character to shine through; maybe it’s just me, but it feels more cozy that way and more representative of the community.

My staff supervisor was busy helping out with a couple who were newly engaged and trying out some menu items for their wedding (how exciting!?). So, Fiona and I grabbed some drinks from the café and waited for a few minutes while we got to catch up in person for the first time.

I got an elderberry lemonade and Fiona got a peach one – they were delicious! P.S., I was obsessed with the tile floors in the café. You can’t see them well here, but they are one of the original heritage features of this building (meaning, the city actually won’t let you replace or modernize them), and I thought they were stunning.

The tour started off with us being guided into the kitchen and meeting some of the staff and youth. I heard stories about how some of the youth and staff found themselves at Youth Opportunities Unlimited which left me feeling inspired and also vindicated in my choice to take a leap of faith and apply to this internship. Really, Youth Opportunities Unlimited does incredible things for our London community that are not limited to the Fiti collaboration. I felt very grateful to meet these people and hear their stories – I think that experience will stick with me for a long time.

We then made our way to the rooftop, which is a beautiful open space with patio seating and an herb garden! (I am a big gardening fan, so of course, I was intrigued). The team at Youth Opportunities Unlimited came up with this idea because maintaining an herb garden is a cost effective way for people to learn how to be self-sufficient with food security and also incorporate micronutrients into their diet that don’t cost a fortune at the grocery store. What a great idea, right?

They also had a garden bed with The Three Sisters. The Three Sisters are a type of polycropping, where multiple plants are grown together to harvest at once. Indigenous Peoples of North America knew that growing maize (corn), a squash, and climbing beans together ensured for a viable harvest as all three plants worked together to thrive. It’s a very different type of agricultural system than contemporary North American monoculture, but it’s fascinating to learn how plants just “know” how to keep each other safe and successful in growth. I loved seeing it incorporated into both the garden system and education at Youth Opportunities Unlimited!

The Three Sisters garden bed atop the Youth Opportunities Unlimited YOU Made It! café.

Fiona and I were shown the different levels of the building where the café exists. This included a youth court room which allows youth to receive justice services without having to be sent alone to a courthouse; a place for dental and medical services; rooms for housing; job training, etc. There was so much all in one place, and it’s all intended to help with youth stability and success in the community. The building and everything it offers are really something to marvel at.

After our tour, Fiona and I sat down with some of the staff team members to do some real work. We discussed how to facilitate some of the goals I had set out, and I feel like we are really making progress on what we planned back in May!

At the end of the day, I made sure to buy myself a jar of Mushed by YOU jam (strawberry rhubarb, of course), and I headed home to try it. (P.S. it’s delicious).

That’s all the updates I have for now, I’m excited to keep the ball rolling on some of the goals we set and are working on at the moment. I’m looking forward to sharing with you how (hopefully!!!) these goals come to life.

Bye for now 🙂

Hi July… you showed up early.

It’s hard to believe the summer is half over, and with it, the internship.

No really.. where did the time go? I feel like May was yesterday. My internship is half over. My summer course is more than half over. I only have two months left (more like a month and a half) to wrap up my projects before school starts? If only summer could last forever. *sigh*

Right now, I’m working on a few deliverables for Western Heads East to help with onboarding future interns. These include a master document of all relevant information regarding the health benefits, social enterprise accomplishments, and the history of Fiti probiotic yogurt. I’m hoping that this document serves as both a crash course to the internship and a central location where the most up-to-date, accurate information can be found. My goal is that future interns will be able to use this information for education, social media and marketing purposes, and for their own reports/endeavours.

I’m also doing something similar for the future interns of Western Heads East x Youth Opportunities Unlimited. Future interns should (hopefully) have an easier time planning events, getting in touch with the right people, and seeing their ideas come to life. If you read my last blog post about resilience, these projects were born from that experience! I’m doing what I can to turn that lesson into tangible, meaningful action for others. What else can you do, right?

So, if you are thinking about applying to be a Western Heads East Intern next year – and even more so, if you plan to apply for a position with Youth Opportunities Unlimited – I’ll be waiting on my thanks from you!

Original photo by juliastration.

I have been hearing so many amazing stories from the other interns about their experiences abroad. There are interns teaching classes, conducting primary research, helping start small businesses… it’s truly incredible. While I have been compiling all the information I can find to write my master document of information, I truly began to appreciate the breadth of impact that Western Heads East and the Fiti probiotic yogurt program have had.

Probiotic yogurt is about much more than gut health – although that is a large part of the obvious benefits – but the program is also about economic and social empowerment, education, and community connectedness. Part of my research into this document included reading (and re-reading) this article by Western University about the program. I was stunned by stories of women who have benefitted from the economic empowerment of the Fiti probiotic yogurt enterprise enough to send their children to university! The enterprise has created a self-sustaining wheel of abundance for (especially) women and girls in East African countries.

And I found myself today beaming with gratitude to be contributing to its expansion, even if it’s a very, very small amount.

Anyways, by the time I am posting this article, the weekend will have technically started – and it’s Canada Day weekend! So, although I have my reservations about celebrating this holiday as do many others given Canada’s Indigenous history, I will sign off for now and take the long weekend to rest and reflect. If you’re reading this in Canada, whenever you get to it, I hope that you were able to do the same.

Until next time – talk to you soon.

Let’s Talk Resilience

When I was fifteen, my first job was working in a kitchen at a small business in London.

I learned a lot from that job: the value of hard work, team building, and how being reliable can benefit you in the long run, even if that means picking up extra shifts, staying late, or volunteering to do a messy job. (In a kitchen… there are a lot of messy jobs). It took a while to learn these lessons because again, I was fifteen when I first started, and that was my first job ever. I stayed there for quite a long time (until I was almost 22), and only left during the COVID-19 pandemic after I had been promoted to lead waitress but… there were no tables to serve. By the time I left, I had a lot to reflect on, including one story I’m going to share with you now about the value of self-direction and self assurance.

I remember my first day vividly. It was an afternoon shift where I was working directly with the manager while she prepped food for the evening rush. I was scheduled from 11:00 am until 3:00 pm; a short shift, but I soon came to realize that, depending on the day, it could go by very fast or agonizingly slow. The manager asked me, for my first job, to sweep the kitchen and then do an inventory count of all the raw ingredients we had in the industrial-sized fridge. Those tasks took me about 20 minutes in total, and afterwards, I (confidently) asked out loud: “so, what can I do next?”

If you have ever worked in food service or retail, you know that’s not a great question to ask.

I quickly learned that I was supposed to “make work” for myself; whether that be washing dishes the minute they are dirtied by other staff or wiping down counters that were already clean. Idling was not an option, and there was always something to do. If you couldn’t find anything to do in the kitchen, you would check the dining room, the bathrooms, the staff office – anywhere – and you would make work for yourself.

Image sourced from Francesco Ciccolella.

It sounds kind of silly, doesn’t it? And I certainly thought it was when I was there. But, my now 24-year-old (and a half) self reflects fondly on the particular lesson I learned from making work. There is always something that can be improved upon. It takes a skillful eye and ambitious spirit to learn a job well enough to identify even minuscule tasks that could be undertaken to make something run smoother, work better, or make other peoples lives easier.

If you are reading this as one of my past employers, in any paid or volunteer setting, then I’m sure you understand now where my ambitious ideas tend to come from… even if they aren’t always feasible. Transferring my learned knack for identifying problems to be solved into current endeavours has come alongside a need to grow thick skin, precisely because of that feasibility point. Most of the time, you can identify issues in work or life, fix them, and maybe even receive some praise for doing so. But, not everything is feasible, even if it’s a great idea.

I’m telling you this story because recently, an idea I had was on track to be a great one – but it wasn’t feasible. And that’s okay.

I tried my best to prepare as far in advance as I could have to undertake a very large (and admittedly, daunting) task during the first half of this internship. I identified an area where I could use my skills to make something better, I organized a digital filing system so anyone who needed to could track my progress; I curated proposals, I ensured they were reviewed well in advance of deadlines, but at the end of the day, it just didn’t work out. Of course, I’m a little disheartened, but that does not mean I’m going to give up and it certainly does not mean I don’t have more ideas up my sleeve; it’s been almost ten years since I started that first job, but my learned propensity to seek improvement has not left me.

Most importantly, and something I learned through trial and error (hardship and rejection, really), is that a keystone characteristic of a strong person is resilience.

I’m going to choose to be resilient with this one, despite however many hours went in to a project that won’t work out. What I can do instead is reflect on what could have been done differently, and possibly even use the materials I created to help future interns with facilitating large passion projects that they want to undertake. If at the end of the day, what I have done for the first half of this internship is make the jobs of others easier in the long run, then I am okay with that.

An old picture of me at the job with a coworker (used with permission; circa 2017).

Happy June!

What a couple of weeks it has been – I’m excited to share it all with you!

Since you last heard from me, I have done quite a bit. Before we dive into that, I want to acknowledge the very cool and interesting work done by other interns this year so far. As a larger group, we meet once a week, so I have been enjoying hearing all the stories shared by both remote and on-site interns. The interns thus far are working on education and health promotion plans, and even conducting in-person lessons in journalism – how cool?! I feel very lucky to be a part of this years intern cohort and working alongside such talented and inspiring students.

So, onto what I’ve been up to.

Image by user mui_mui from freepik.com

In my first meeting with my supervisor from Youth Opportunities Unlimited (YOU), we spoke about how the needs of the organization from Western Heads East interns varies somewhat depending on what the scope of YOU’s goals are at that time. I decided to dive into some past intern materials (which, thank you all for being so diligent with your record keeping), and figure out where my skills could be best used.

At first, I was overwhelmed by the number of documents I had to read through, but before long it felt like I was reading a story – a story of the successful implementation of the Fiti enterprise in London. As I continued to read, I made notes about what was needed, and where I could contribute.

I decided to divide my goals for the summer into short-term, mid-term, and long-term goals; each of those was given a specific heading to guide the scope of my work. In the short term, I want to work on health and social promotion, education, and celebratory community outreach. You’ll have to check back here in a few weeks to see what I mean by celebratory community outreach, as I have heard its unlucky to share plans in development before they come to fruition!

In the mid term, I am hoping to get a head start to collaborating with other meal delivery programs in the city – I’m very lucky to be working with an organization such as YOU that already has a vast reputation in London for doing good work. This part of the plan should come easy (fingers crossed). In the long term, I’ll be tackling menu development and seeing where it makes sense to expand in that regard. Exciting stuff! It would sound more exciting if I could tell you everything… but again, you’ll have to wait and see.

This upcoming week I’m meeting with new work-study students who are joining me with these endeavours! I’ll be working with them to see where, within the broader scope of YOU and my own projects, they can contribute. So far, they have both been super friendly and I’m excited to update you on how that is going.

I think that’s all the updates I have for now – I have to get back to organizing for my celebratory outreach! Oh, by the way, I have come to learn that the work from home stereotype about working in a business top and pyjama bottoms is totally true. Highly recommend!

Bye for now!

Taking the First Steps

Over the past few weeks, my internship with Western Heads East has taken off! Let me take you back to late April:

Preparations for my role began with making sure I was well-versed in ethical global engagement, which was really important to me as a major underlying theme of working with Western Heads East is acknowledging global power relations. I had come to learn that a large part of my internship with Youth Opportunities Unlimited will be to implement the existing Fiti enterprise here in London, the same one already thriving in African countries. During the ethical global engagement discussions, our discussion was centred around how existing power dynamics in global relations imply that the Global South often has much to learn from the Global North (and same goes for East, and West, respectively). However, my role with Youth Opportunities Unlimited and Western Heads East is primarily to act on the reversal of that assumption, and learn as much as I can from community partners and business practices from Africa. I had a lot to reflect on regarding what this means for me; as I read through past intern works and documents, I am able to see how they have done so with grace, and I only hope to do right by the work that has already been done.

Image from: OhMeOhMy

In mid-April, we switched from online modules to in-person discussions, which were great because not only could I get to know the other interns in my cohort, but I could hear their unique perspectives first hand. I felt inspired by the diverse perspectives of the interns this year, and how each of them intended to bring their unique skillsets to each internship. Although I am the only intern (at present) working with Youth Opportunities Unlimited and the rest are either working with African partners remotely or on-site, I have faith that they will all be successful in their roles.

I also got a chance to meet up with some of the on-site interns to learn how to make Fiti yogurt myself – which was so fun! Thanks to the hard work by Dr. Sharareh Hekmat, we were able to learn about, create, and taste test the product for ourselves.

The last part of the formal training was the part I was most excited about, Swahili lessons! Timing was a bit tricky as my final exam season was wrapping up, and our first lesson happened right after my last exam finished, but I made sure to rush home so I wouldn’t miss anything important. We had a graduate student in the Department of Languages graciously volunteer her time to teach us some of the basic words and phrasing of Swahili; picking up the dialect was much easier than I had originally thought. I’ll be honest, I was quite intimidated to speak Swahili out loud, worried I would sound foolish, but patience from our teacher and encouragement from the team made the process more seamless than I imagined. Although I likely won’t need to utilize it within my role, I will certainly never pass up an opportunity to learn something new!

That brings us to today. It’s mid May now, and already I have met with my contact at Youth Opportunities Unlimited. We discussed my strengths and goals of the internship; I was so thankful he wanted to know what I was interested in. I have come to learn that this internship is what you make of it, so I decided to utilize this opportunity to enhance my skills in science communication, health promotion, and community engagement. I am hopeful that the folks at Youth Opportunities Unlimited are just as excited as I am to dive into tasks and create a working plan so I can showcase these skills!

Now, I am busy continuing to read past intern materials and business plans. This week, the remote interns are all meeting on zoom together to discuss our next steps. Rumour has it that I may be working alongside another work-study student, so fingers crossed I get a partner! I’ll be sure to keep you updated as things change.

Bye for now,

Allison