Networking!!!

(I wrote this yesterday night in the train coming home)

Today I'm arriving home from my first local job. I started today as a tutor (kind of an academic assistant) in the course "Sustainable Development and the Urban Environment" from the Master in Sustainable Development in the UNSW.

This is a casual job (only for this trimester) of only 3 hours a week... not enough to support myself but enough to help a bit and important enough to be my first local experience.

Now, why the title of the post? Why "networking"? Well, thanks to this I got this job. Last year at the congress I attended in Perth, I met a professor of the UNSW. We exchanged a few emails after the congress and of course this year I let him know I was arriving in Sydney in February. To make the story short, we met and while talking about my settlement here I let him know I was looking for a job... after enquiring about whether I wanted to work in the academic or professional area (both of them which I love) and about my visa conditions, he said: "You know, Gaby, this trimester I'm teaching a course about urban design and sustainability and I've been told I can work with 4 tutors (he explained what that was here and the responsibilities of the position). It's only for this trimester and only a few hours a week, but if you'd like I can send you the syllabus for you to read and if you're interested I'd be happy to work with you."

As you can imagine I was jumping up and down in my head, dancing as the Ally McBeal baby jajaja, but had my poker face on jajaja... so we agreed to that. He also asked me to send him my resume and a sustainable urban project in which I have worked.

We started talking about the last project I worked in and that I left it because of ethical principles, and about the way I design and how people for me is the most important aspect of the design process... well it turned out that he thought the same way I did... ; he said that after all he heard he would gladly work with me in any project :-)

Anyway, the next day I sent him the resume and images if that project, he sent me the syllabus, I called him a couple if hours later and told him I'd love to work as a tutor for his course :-) and that was it.

Today I submitted to the uni the signed contract and had my first class. The best thing is that this is a course I would have taken because it's not only an interesting topic but also a cutting edge approach. I'm going to learn SO MUCH, because I have to understand and manage all the materials in order to be able to guide the students... and all of those are topics I can easily apply to my professional area... it's going to be great!!! And the best of all is the timetable... the class is Thursdays from 6-9 pm so I can keep looking and get a full time job without interfering with one another.

So keep working on your networks and above all be true to yourselves!!!!