Career u-turn for brave Tracey Tracey Simpson is a mature student and has been working with Waterford Chamber over the past year. Here she tells her story of returning to full-time education at South East Technological University.
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y name is Tracey, 40+ a single parent, and in 2019 I became a full-time mature student at WIT by taking on a Bachelor’s Degree in Honours Business. In year one, a fellow student asked me, “If you already have a career as a chef, why bother go back to college and at your age?” Well, have you ever woken up in your 40s and felt like you are stuck in a negative loop with your worklife balance and complaining about it doesn’t alter the miserable affect it is having? Well I have. Slowly I came to the realisation that the only person who could break that loop was me, so I guess I took the bull by the horns and smashed the hell out of that loop by choosing a career change and ventured back to college. This was no easy feat for me – I was terrified and completely out of my comfort zone. Year one was a big adjustment and just as I got into a routine, Covid hit, I found myself doing college from my sitting room while homeschooling my child,
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yet I successfully adapted. At the end of year two, I decided to specialise in Marketing. This best suited the skills I acquired through many years as a chef – creativity, adaptability, research, great organisational and communication skills, plus being very comfortable in a fast-paced environment. Before I knew it, I was in year 3 and work placement was on the horizon. I became worried about different issues like my age, child minding etc. I voiced my concerns with Joe Daly, the Director of Placement and lecturer for Business & Management Organisation at SETU. He explained every student has a unique situation and not to worry. Joe rang me a few weeks later confident he had found the perfect work placement. A week later I had an interview with Gerald Hurley, CEO of Waterford Chamber of Commerce, and I started shortly after. On starting my placement, I began questioning my lack of experience in an office environment and
how I was entering a busy organisation armed only with what I had learned in college and my transferrable skills. Fast forward to today and what an honour it was to work with the phenomenal powerhouse of a team that is the Waterford Chamber. They made me feel like part of the team, no question was stupid, they shared their years of experience with me, motivated and challenged me daily, and now I know for certain that marketing is for me. I am now nearing the completion of year 3 and with it the end of my work placement. I have made some lifelong friends and there will be tears shed as I leave and head back to complete my final year. I never thought back in 2019 that I would be going to back to college and coming out with a university degree.
NETWORK • Q2 2022
