My name is Natasha and I recently graduated from the Labour Studies program with a minor in Geography and Earth Studies. Right out of school I was hired by the City of Hamilton as their Youth Engager, where I provided peer-to-peer support to youth through social media campaigns and community events. In October I will start working at RBC as part of their Graduate Rotation Program.

The Social Sciences program at McMaster is unique because of how much flexibility it gives to students in first year. This flexibility gave me an incredible amount of room to grow, learn and try a variety of courses, which lead me to pursue a degree in Labour Studies.

Labour Studies really opened my eyes to real-world situations and problems bring faced in society. This program focuses on politics, law changes, current events and allowed me to develop the necessary skills to critically analyze the world around me. When I started my job with the City of Hamilton, I found that I was using the knowledge gained through this program to help come up with tangible solutions to problems being faced by Hamilton youth.

If I could give one piece of advice to incoming Social Sciences students, it would be to explore as many opportunities and options as you can. By exploring new options, it will help you discover who you are as a person but also who you are going to be professionally. Being a Social Sciences student there are many unique opportunities open to you. In my undergrad, I completed The Mohawk College/McMaster Affiliated Certificate in Business Studies. Through this certificate program, I was able to obtain an official certificate upon graduation along with my diploma, which allowed me to diversify my education and will allow me to be more successful in my future employment opportunities.

I wish you the best of luck at McMaster! I can’t wait for you to see how unique the Social Sciences program is and fall in love with it the way I did.