Hi I'm Amelia I'm a student studying Western Civilization
and today I'm here with Alastair one of my lecturers, and we're going to answer
some of your questions
looks like I've got the first question, what are some of the coolest jobs your
former students are doing? My students have ended up in all sorts
of exciting and interesting places I guess
two of the the most exciting are the museum sector, we've got some
great students working out there putting together
exhibitions explaining things to people, I've also produced other students who've
gone into the arts. I've got a former student who's a filmmaker
producing films based on the stories and ideas they encountered as
part of our courses, so they end up in all sorts of places. What
has been the most unexpected thing you've been happy to discover at UQ?
Probably definitely like, how helpful the like the university is like ,I came into
uni expecting it to be really quite
difficult and a very like solitary sort of experience that's what
people had told me that it was very you know you were alone and you had to
fend for yourself but there's actually like so many um
resources and people that are there to help. You know like
um the student services, you know they call you and that was just such a
surprise for me to know that like people actually do care yeah. What
opportunities do your students have to get hands-on experience in our industry?
Well our students go and do a number of placements, for example at the moment
we've got some students working with the non-profit sector doing uh
interesting research projects on uh indigenous knowledges reconciliation
also research projects involving different
communities social problems, homelessness, the idea is that our
materials and the kinds of ideas that they're encountering their
courses are preparing them to go into all sorts of different places
What are the most valuable skills you've learned as part of your degree?
um oh there's a lot but one that does stand out probably is
the way in that reading a text can really you know, echo to
to my you know contemporary readership so I'm the reader in the present
but I'm engaging with a story that was written years like thousands of years
ago and and then seeing how that relates to
me today you know um the issues and the attitudes and the
values that um I have often they can be they can be
found in the text that I'm reading and it's
really interesting to connect you know the past with the present
and understand you know how we came to be
those stories still echo through to us today and that's what's really so
interesting uh about them and we're we're struggling
with the legacy i think um but both for good and for real yeah
definitely How do you prepare students for the
future when we don't know what the future looks like?
it's a good question um the answer is skills, right
um so the world is constantly changing you know
we don't know what the jobs the future are going to be all the
you know evidence seems to show that you'll have 17 jobs during your life
five different careers so the answer is really skills and we
think that the important skills that we believe
are going to prepare you for the future are going to be
ability to communicate to express ideas clearly
and to research to be able to come up with innovative original solutions
it's that combination of research skills and communication skills that we think
are going to be the really important ones for the future and
i guess the other thing is of course you know the kind of historical
perspective that we provide is really crucial so that idea of that
long perspective that reading text from the past gives you we think is
going to be really important because you know it's that ability to draw upon
the wealth of knowledge and experience that has been occurring over
the centuries that we think is going to be absolutely
crucial. If you're employing the next Western Civilization graduate
what would you be looking for? Well I think with a Western Civilization
graduate what you're getting is someone with a breadth of knowledge they've
encountered texts that are philosophical historical literary um from all sorts of
different ages all sorts of different people so it's
that breadth that i think is really important
but also they've been thinking about how do those texts speak to contemporary
problems how do they help us uh think through
some very wicked issues that we're being confronted with today
so it's that ability to draw upon that wealth of knowledge as
well as being able to apply it in a kind of critical useful
manner that i think really defines what makes a western civilization a student
If you could give me one piece of advice that would set me apart as a job
candidate what would it be? I think it's to make
yourself original, to be creative
you know the idea of madness is described as
doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results you know
if you're going to make a change then you need to walk the
path that other people aren't walking and i think being kind of original
distinctive and creative is the way to go. What have
you learned about yourself since you began your studies at UQ? Um well I'm
just coming up to the end of my my first semester and so i think
in that you know relatively short amount of time I have learnt
a lot, I feel more confident than when i first started
you know if I look back to when I did you know I was really
terrified and really scared that I wouldn't be able
to do what university asked of me and so I've learned that I actually can
I can do you know what they ask and and I'm
I feel more competent and more able and and i sort of actually enjoyed being
challenged more than I did at school and that's giving you have
confidence to go forward yeah definitely um my confidence yeah probably has has
grown i think it definitely just has to when you're thrown into a
new situation like uni um with you know any circumstances
yeah you just definitely learn about yourself
okay well I've got the last question, how does the way you learn at UQ
teach you the skills you need to face an unknown future?
Well we, we do a lot of a lot of group work um a lot of
discussion I think that's the key part especially in Western Civilization is
that um I'm with my peers you know my fellow
students in the cohort and um you know we're having you know
lecturer driven discussion where you know we are sort of
guiding ourselves through our learning and listening to um listening to one
another and i really enjoy like listening to
other people's thoughts um hearing what they have to say because
i find that you know they then take me further to
to places that i wouldn't wouldn't have gone if i was just thinking by myself
so i think with an unknown future um you're sort of surrounded by people the
future will whatever no matter what it looks like
will will be with other people and so listening to them definitely it's
those collaborative skills that are going to really take so important
because as you say you know we're never alone we're always
surrounded by people and i think being you know part of a group knowing how to
kind of work as a group and discuss and cream up with creative ideas
is going to be really important definitely
you