Patricia Dragan

In 2018 Patricia Dragan was an alumni ambassador for the School of Informatics at the Post-Offer Visit Day.

Post-Offer Visit Days are aimed at applicants who received the offer of admission and they are an opportunity for prospective students to meet teaching staff and current students. Here, Patricia shares her experience of the day and talking to new students.

Name	Patricia Dragan
Programme	Computer Science
Graduated	2016

Why did you sign up to be an Alumni Ambassador?

I signed up to be an ambassador because I still feel quite close to the University where I grew up as an adult, and I am reminded that part of me misses the whole experience a little every time I walk past the campus. I enjoyed my time as a student a lot, and I learned one or more things about how the world works. I felt the need to share my experiences and all the good things that the university shed light upon in my life, especially because I appreciated it myself as a student when people who have graduated themselves came to network with us, and share the secrets to post academic life. I also enjoy expanding my social circle, I feel that meeting people and talking face to face matters more than a thought shared over the internet. I have had moments in the past where students were recognising me from open day events and said ‘hi’ to me, and it did fill me up with joy that I made a difference in that person's life, which is what I am hoping to do further as well: help current and future students embrace what the University and City of Edinburgh have to offer, with all of their vibrant cultural and intellectual values.

What did you enjoy on the day?

I enjoyed sharing my experiences with others, chatting to the future students, trying to encourage them to be positive about what the future has to offer. I try to be transparent and share my honest thoughts about what it's like to study here, to live in the city, of course I personally enjoyed my time a lot, and there is no other University I would have rather gone to, but I do try to make a parallel to what it is like in general to start your journey somewhere new, where you might not know anyone, where not just the city, but the country itself might be completely foreign. Spending that short amount of time after the talks with students, I got to know them a little more, and I enjoyed sharing some thoughts and learning new facts myself. I also really appreciated networking with the student ambassadors, it's great to see what different career paths people choose, and how varied the university paths can be.

What did you gain from the experience?

I feel that I have expanded my social network, I got to meet great people, both staff from the University, and students, as well as my peers, who helped out on the day, and, lastly, the guests who were all quite excited for the eventful day. I do not do much public speaking in my day to day job at the moment, and i actually really enjoyed talking in front of the guests about what my experience had been like, and I feel that it gives me more confidence every time I have to present something personal that I know very well.

Why do you think it’s important that prospective/current students speak to Alumni?

I think it's important that students speak to Alumni because we can share what it was like for us while we were students, what good and bad choices we had made, what we wish we would have done differently, and hopefully pass our mistakes on as lessons for the generations to follow us. We share our career experiences, how job hunting was for us, what we did to gain and show the right skills to right people. Each one of us has followed a different path, and every single one of my old peers does something exciting with their life at the moment, using knowledge gained from our time at the university. Adulthood is very scary when you have to walk more or less on your own, without as much guidance from academic staff and friends, and us, as alumni are here to boost up confidence and positivity and open up opportunities for the younger millennials to go explore, and learn from what we have done and knowledge we offer.

This article was first published in 2018. For updates on what Patricia is doing now, find her LinkedIn below.