From KI Student to KI Manager

Tell us a bit about your background. Where did you grow up and what were your main interests?

I was born in France and moved to Toronto when I was  four years old. A lot of my childhood was marked by figuring out how to become bilingual and to exploring different interests each year.

My parents and my school encouraged me to have a broad variety of hobbies and extracurricular activities. I took piano lessons and did gymnastics, circus and swimming. I got involved in different clubs like choir, theatre, and later on, orchestra. I've always been an avid reader and love to explore both imaginary worlds and different topics of conversation.

What is your primary commitment now — personally and professionally?

Professionally, I’m beginning my third year of working for Knowledge Integration department at UW. In my first year and a half, I worked as the Undergraduate Advisor and am now starting my second year as manager. The years since graduation have been a journey of exploration, including quickly finding out that my expected dream job of consultancy wasn’t for me. Working with students and employers at a non-profit devoted to work placements across Canada was much more fulfilling and helped to set the stage for my current work in KI.

Personally, I am testing out new hobbies every couple of months, from pottery classes to volleyball and west coast swing dancing, and horseback riding. I am always hunting for something that makes my soul sing. And of course, I’m still reading a ton!

How and why did you decide to join KI when you entered the university?

Intellectually, I had decided that I would complete the Arts & Science program at University of Guelph. Emotionally, I quickly realized that this decision wasn’t feeling genuine. So I chose Knowledge Integration, and that felt right.

KI is distinguished by its intellectual rigor, flexibility and close sense of community. I knew I wanted to be able to make friends in a small setting and wanted to combine interests in many areas. Ultimately, I compared the areas of focus I wanted to complete at Guelph’s Art & Science vs. KI. KI had more minors I was interested in and offered the possibility of exploring more than two of them. And the thought of creating a museum exhibition in third year was thrilling. It combined hands-on learning with research and close collaboration. A common topic for discussion among KI graduates is this: "What did your team do for your museum exhibit"

Which class have you found most valuable professionally or personally? Why?

Although my INTEG classes have been extremely useful, Speech Communication 101 was one of my favourite courses and one I still think about, no matter where I am in my professional life. In that course, we explored different communication theories. It was a lightbulb moment for me to see how humans communicate with each other in both inefficient and in very kind ways. Nuances in language can deeply influence action, behaviours and emotions. Learning how to craft the perfect message or understanding the unconscious messages being sent through phrasing was a real eye-opener.

Real World Problem Solving, taught by Vanessa Schweizer was a KI-specific course that I have found especially useful professionally. In this eight-month long course, our team worked with a client at Communitech around blockchain – a topic which was new to us. This experience was valuable in learning how to communicate with a client and see how we could apply our current learning and research to a new and unfamiliar topic. It was a very practical course in learning how to define the problem, complete research and prototype different solutions through presentations and check ins with clients. When I worked in consulting for a brief time, I was particularly glad to have taken the course and felt confident I had some baseline in interacting with clients and their portfolio.

These insights help me a lot in my work today. When I speak to prospective students, I ask myself how I can best communicate with them depending on their interests or goals. Do I focus on the community aspect of the program? The courses? My personal experience as an alum?

And, in our personal lives, how do we manage conflict and expectations through language? How do we use sarcasm, nuances and passive-aggressive messages to let someone know our true emotions even when our literal words may not reveal what we think? I find language fascinating this way, especially as someone for whom English is a second language.

Are there any revisions or expansions to KI that you would love to see?

I think it would be great for KI students to take more group-based classes outside of KI. KI students tend to work (or learn to work) nicely with other KI students. But that won’t be real life after graduation. Many people in the workplace haven’t been exposed to collaboration in the same way, and many don’t think it’s an achievable goal. Those are the situations for which KI students need to be prepared.

What advice might you give to students entering or considering KI?

• Finding a balance between KI's flexibility and one's personal focus is important. KI students face the unique problem in that they can have too many doors open. It’s important (and very challenging) to decide which doors to close. I advise students to slow down. Don’t try to complete as many minors as you possibly can for the sake of maximizing your options. Instead, take the time to reflect and understand what interests you – then see what minors can be strategically advantageous to your desired career paths.
• Give yourself some leeway to explore courses just because! Learning is supposed to be fun, and so many KI students are intrinsically curious. It would be a shame to reduce that curiosity just to add more words to a final diploma.
• And lastly, don’t underestimate the importance of the skills through in the core KI courses. Within the KI community, we don’t always understand how special and important those skills can be – once in the professional working world, you’ll see just how crucial those collaboration, critical thinking, problem solving, communication (the list goes on!) skills will be.

This interview is part of a project conducted by Dr. Mary Stewart during her two-month fellowship at the University of Waterloo in the fall of 2022. Thank you to Dr. Stewart for her work in highlighting the transdisciplinary nature of the KI program and its community members, and to Fulbright Canada for making this opportunity possible.