A Journey with Yellow Shirts

Since April 2018, Catherine Rich (5th year UNSW Bachelor of Chemical Engineering and Science) have been a busy bee coordinating Arc’s 2019 O-Week that kicks off on 11 February. This is her fourth year in a row being a part of the team, and we wanted to understand why she finds it so great. 

Four years ago, she applied to become one of O-Week's 160 student volunteers called Yellow Shirts. She had felt quite siloed at her faculty and wanted to get to know students from all over the university. Becoming a Yellow Shirt meant that she got to meet students from not only Science but Medicine, Business, Law and more.

She really enjoyed being a part of the team and also saw opportunities to learn valuable skills. 

When she was offered a team leader position the following year, she welcomed the new responsibilities with open arms. As a team leader, she was in charge of a team of eight volunteers. Even though delegating tasks and motivating the team was new to her, she enjoyed this challenge too. 

Again, being offered to become one of nine members of the organising team, she was excited to learn more about the logistics of running one of the largest university orientation weeks in the Southern Hemisphere which has been running since 1990 and replicated by universities all over the world. 

“I used to be a much more quiet, reserved person before I applied for Yellow Shirts. All the new people I have met have really broadened my perspective, and continuously being given new responsibilities made me realise that I can do whatever I put my mind to. My confidence has grown, a lot! And I have definitely kept on pushing the limits of my comfort zone”. 

Today she is in her last few weeks of being the Coordinator of the 2019 O-Week, where she oversees the organising team and makes sure they are on the right track in planning for the week that is filled with events running both day and night. 

“It has been a crazy experience and I can’t believe we are almost at the finish line. I have been so lucky to work with a great team with such different individuals. Learning how to connect the dots between the members of the team and seeing who can best solve an issue when it arises, is probably the most important thing I have learnt from this”. 

Because of everything she has learnt and how she has developed as a person through her various roles, she wants to encourage other students to also get involved – and believe O-Week is the right place to do it.

“O-Week is not only a place to get excited before the semester starts but also where you will get to know all the amazing opportunities you can get involved in, including volunteering, sports, clubs and more”. 

Find out more about O-Week here.

O-Week

P:(02) 9065 0909

E:o.week@arc.unsw.edu.au