Meet Lauren, SpaceportX newest intern!

Meet Lauren, SpaceportX newest intern! She’s just completed her first year of college and is here with to dive into Manchester’s lively tech community and to meet network and meet new people. Over to you Lauren…!

I decided to intern here at SpacePortX because I wanted to experience the working culture, especially a unique one, like SpacePortX . Questions such as, what kind of jobs could I end up doing? Or What kind of people will I meet? Made me want to do it even more.

I didn’t come to Spaceportx with an aim to learn anything specific, I came open to anything new, perhaps even to improve some of my own skills and aspects. The experience I gain may become useful to me during my time in university and even benefit me further into the future,

Within my first day here at Spaceportx, alongside side small jobs, I have already been allowed to unleash my creativity by doing artwork on the ‘event’ blackboard. Being an art student at college, this was a job I really enjoyed. Even though the job was simply drawing and writing on a blackboard, it gave me freedom to experiment and just let my imagination flow through a series of drawings and scribbles with a pen. Who knows? I may even end up working on a bigger project dealing with a bigger space and more responsibility!

Before I came to work at Spaceportx, I finished my first year of A-levels. I recently completed most of the National Citizen Service (NCS) Programme. The main body of NCS is split into 3 weeks. During the first week I was in Scotland completing physical challenges that required teamwork with people I had never met before. In the second week we stayed in the halls at Salford University. During the stay, we completed a public speaking session and a media project in collaboration with the residents at Pembroke Court. We documented their stories and experiences of their time at the home all in time for a showcase on our project.

Lastly, the most challenging week, the third week. Our aim, was to gain funding of £50 for a campaign related to our social partner “Relate” a relationship counselling organisation. After hearing about how many children go to counselling for issues such as abuse, grief and bereavement, we decided that our focus would be on helping children. From our public survey, we found that child abuse was the issue most people were concerned about and so our campaign SPEAK was initiated. After much planning, budgeting and researching for our campaign, it finally came to the day of our pitch. We were able to get the full £50 and our campaign will take place in September.

I think my time at NCS really gave me that extra push and it definitely made my first day much easier, as well as the calm and warm atmosphere here at Spaceportx. Before any of this I would have been shy and reluctant to meet and talk to new people but now that I’ve pitched to over 80 people with a team I didn’t know a month ago, I feel that I have become less reserved and am able to do much more.

Spaceportx will allow me to interact with even more people from different backgrounds each with their own unique experiences, whether it be through events or simply just by talking to the people working next to me just as I did at NCS, I will be able to work with new people and slowly build my confidence and skills knowing that I do have people around me that I can work with and ask for help when I need it.

We are very excited to welcome Lauren to SpacePortX buzzing family so make sure to say hello and have a chat with her :)