This conversation between the VP of Human Resources at Cornell and Labor Relations Professor solidified the work beliefs I have.  “Work is a part of our core”, as said by Mary Opperman, I believe it is part of human dignity and agree with Professor Cornell in this manner.  This conversation opened my eyes to the many facets of human resources and human dynamics.  The pandemic opened our eyes to many inequities that need to be addressed along with the social justice opportunities that we can act upon.  For me, this conversation made me aware of the need for essential workers and the manner of our treatment of these workers. In particular, professor Cornell’s Labor Law Clinic stories are eye opening and sometimes shocking.  The need for this clinic is obvious and necessary. I am grateful to be made aware of these fantastic undertakings at Cornell.

Finally, the best advice was choose a meaningful career, choose a rewarding career – for happiness.  Do not be solely motivated by the income. Focus on the positive in your journey rather than the negative.  This is important in looking for opportunities. I also enjoyed thinking about leadership in your career.  I also thought about the expert advice.  Best advice- you don’t have to be an expert to lead something- just realize you are not the expert- and hire the best people who are the experts. The key is humility and leadership with human dignity in mind.

Laura and Christa talked a bit about how they enjoy working with college-aged young adults who are developing independence and starting to explore themselves and their interests for the first time. I have been experiencing this first hand. When I came to college I didn’t really expect just how much I would learn, how hard I would work, or how my interests would diverge. My parents gave me a lot of independence when I was in high school and I didn’t really expect there to be much of a transition. But when I got to college I was surprised by being on my own. My parents had given be independence in terms of not placing a lot of restrictions on me, but this was the first time that I was really acting as my own person and looking at my own interests. Just being in a new environment where I wasn’t talking to them as frequently made me realize that I might not be the same person that I had imagined myself to be in high school.

I thought this was a very interesting and helpful interview of Laura Weiss and Christa Downey. Something that really stood out to me was their parting advice at the end. One thing Christa spoke of remaining committed to your calendar so you can be at your best. I really liked this comment for it highlighted to me that you need to have self-control to ensure the best success for yourself. I have always really struggled with holding myself accountable, but this does seem like a good way to start. One thing Laura spoke of was separating yourself from your work and not letting it become your main identity. I must agree that this is something I really needed to hear. It becomes easy to assume that all that matters in your life is your work, but there is so much more to live for. All in all, I am really happy to have listened to these two panelists share their backstory and give some really great advice to us.

There is so much comfort I have in knowing that there are adults at Cornell whose jobs and passions are to support students’ well-being and future plans. Laura Weiss (Sexual Violence Prevention Program Coordinator and Victim Advocate) and Christa Downey (Director of the Cornell Engineering Career Center) are two of these student advocates who genuinely love to support and care for students like you and me. One important question that came up during the Fellow Interview with these two asked how their work on campus has shifted now that COVID has changed pretty much everything about how they interact with students. And, to my surprise, I realized that COVID’s impact can really go both ways.

For Ms. Weiss, COVID has restricted her ability to contact students physically and has made it difficult to manage work and life now that she is home all the time. It’s hard enough being a working mother alone, but with COVID merging work with home, Ms. Weiss has had to bear the challenges of managing time effectively (as I’m sure many can relate to, even if not a working mother!). But at the same time, Ms. Weiss has found that students are still open to using the Women’s Resource Center as a safe-place (though virtual) to reach out for help when they need it– in fact, it seems like students are even more encouraged to reach out now that Zoom is an option. It’s convenient and sometimes less intimidating than meeting in person, which means more people can receive the help they need as soon as they need it. And that is amazing! Ms. Weiss’s sacrifices have allowed students to continue receiving the support they need even amidst a pandemic– I am thankful for her hard work!

In a similar manner, Ms. Downey has experienced both the highs and lows of COVID at the Cornell Engineering Career Center side of campus. The one-on-one conversations that are vital to giving effective training for interviews, resume building, and networking may have been moved to virtual settings, but this convenience has made it super easy for students to get in contact with career advisers. We now have access to advice and support pretty much on the spot! How convenient! But at the same time, the Career Center’s hands-on and community-oriented workshops have been put on hold. These great spaces for learning and training with career coaches just can’t be replicated on Zoom, and has thus been hard to lose according to Ms. Downey. Regardless, I myself am grateful for the work Ms. Downey and the Career Center has put into preparing students for their post-grad plans, despite the challenges COVID has issued!

I love hearing about the workings behind the scenes of the services that help so many undergraduate students every day. At Cornell, I have taken advantage of the wonderful career centers for their tips, resources, and group sessions to help us plan out our futures. It was really interesting to hear Christa Downey’s perspective, as she has spent many years running the Arts and Science career center and more recently the Engineering career center. I found it interesting that she noted the Arts and Sciences career center has a more exploratory nature than engineering, where many students are more narrowly focused on specific career goals. I think it is important to share their exploratory feeling and be open to people and experiences while we are in college. I also really resonated with her emphasis on helping to encourage women in stem fields! In addition, I loved hearing from Laura about her experiences at the Sexual Violence Prevention Center. She is so committed to helping others through everything she does, and I found that inspiring.

In this Rose Buzz, it was interesting to hear how Laura’s extracurriculars were able to impact her life in such a positive way. When I came to Cornell, at first, I didn’t join any extracurricular. I was sick of doing several extracurriculars in high school to help me get into college. When I actually got into Cornell, I thought that extracurriculars were a waste of time and that I would never join any. However, recently, I’ve been realizing that there are clubs and activities that might be interesting to join for fun. Laura’s statement about how extracurriculars positively impacted her life confirmed my belief that I should seek out some interesting extracurriculars as soon as possible. Additionally, Laura and Christa spoke about how virtual appointments have made it easier for students to get help easier. Although I found this to be good, in my opinion, I wouldn’t feel comfortable making an appointment on zoom. I hope that once things return to normal, hopefully, they’ll resume with a lot of in-person appointments for other students who are feeling the same and need help.

At this interview, I was reassured that Cornell is always doing everything they can to preserve everyone’s mental health, and I greatly appreciate this school for that. However, I also learned that even if the Cornell staff does everything they can, they cannot help fix everything, so it also up to the students to help themselves. The two biggest pieces of advice Weiss and Downey gave that resonated with me is that you should never be a bystander and to have someone to vent to. The first is very obvious, but not a lot of people actually follow through with it. Even if someone is just being slightly mean, if you’re a bystander and witnessing this happening, speaking up about it can improve someone’s day and even their life immensely. Not everyone has someone to vent to either. A lot of the stress that students build up is from not being able to properly express their frustrations and thinking to themselves “why is this happening to me?” so being able to vent to someone is very important. I also learned that it is important not to only have someone to vent to, but to be someone that people can vent to as well, so you can help everyone become less stressed.

I went to the talk with Laura Weiss and Christa Downey. They both do amazing work with advocating and with making sure victims of assault are heard, and then inspiring students to pursue what they are most interested in. I know that the most logical things to talk about here would be their work, however I was left very inspired by the side comments they made that came as an indirect result of their work. What stuck with me was their tips and tricks for being bold, and finding yourself by trying new hobbies or taking very different classes than what you are used to. You may find unexpected new paths and being bold leaves more opportunities in life. Amongst the fun and work it is equally important to relax and be able to separate work from personal life. Following these general tips will make a person happier and help in the long run.