The University of Newcastle has celebrated achievements of seven students during their Career-ready Placements at the annual Employability Excellence Awards, including a future doctor who trained in Tamworth.
Medicine student Yannick De Silva won the Student Employability Achievement Award at Thursday night’s award. Yannick completed placement at Peel Clinical School in Tamworth, while working part time at Farrer Memorial Agricultural High School as a mentor and supervisor for boarders.
“My placement at Peel Clinical School, based in Tamworth, was probably one of the best experiences I’ve ever done.
“It was a great way to get involved in rural health and really appreciate the disparities that affect rural communities compared to metropolitan centres.
“This, I believe, has really made me culturally aware and more sensitive to these discrepancies and will shape my practice moving forward,” he said.
“While I was at Tamworth, at Peel Clinical School, I also worked parttime as a boarding school supervisor. This was at the local boys boarding school, where I essentially provided mentorship and teaching to some of the boarders there, and it provided me a really great opportunity to be a mentor and to be a role model for these boys as they enter the university.
“Winning the Student Employability Achievement Award is one of the most humbling awards I could have received. It’s certainly a great testament to the hard work that I’ve put into my medical studies and it’s great to finally get some recognition moving forward into my career,” Yannick said.
Yannick has completed six years of service with St John’s Ambulance as an Advanced First Aid Responder and Clinical Educator and has been involved in developing an IV cannulation workshop for preclinical students, volunteering as a first aider in his local community, and holding leadership roles within his medical faculty.
“I’ve been heavily involved in multiple extracurricular activities, most notably St John’s Ambulance, which I’ve been part of for about six years. St John’s Ambulance has really shaped my personal and professional growth, and I believe has made me a better clinician,” he said.
“With my time in St John’s Ambulance, I’ve learned a lot more about pre-hospital care, about managing critically unwell patients, and this is very important in the areas of medicine – in particular in emergency and critical care. I think I’d like to be able to bring this into my future career.
“I think real world experiences should be in combination with academic and studying experiences. I think just being a student and studying content alone isn’t sufficient enough in making one ready for a career in whatever degree that they’re pursuing.
“I think having these diverse experiences will give a newfound sense of appreciation for what a career like that entails, but it also gives your employability skills a little bit of a boost as well in making you job ready.”
University of Newcastle Vice-Chancellor and President, Professor Alex Zelinsky, explained that the awards reflect the university’s commitment to producing life-ready graduates.
“A university degree is about more than just the skills learnt from a textbook.”
“We want our graduates to have the skills and attributes that help them to be leaders who are career-ready, community-minded and culturally responsive – skills that will make them highly employable and successful when they enter the workforce,” he said.
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