Student Stories

Reprinted with permission from The Discourse

Vancouver Island University (VIU) attracts international students from around the world and from various different climates. For Lurana McClure Rodriguez, who grew up in Puerto Rico, Vancouver Island’s environment felt like the closest home away from home. Wanting to study something design and arts-related, interior design gave her a wide range of opportunities to learn and specialize in. Now, at the end of her degree, Rodriguez finds that her final grades aren’t the greatest achievement.

After a seven-year stint as a heavy equipment operator in Fort McMurray, Alberta, Adam Klassen decided it was time for a change. 

“I was exhausted with commuting weekly [and] I wanted to seek work closer to home,” he says. Through a co-worker of his girlfriend, Adam found out about VIU's Fundamentals of Forestry Harvesting Practices (FFHP) certificate program.

Now that I am back in Germany, I already miss Canada, VIU, my friends there and, yes, even the online classes. Prior to my departure, doubts crept into my mind about if I should go abroad during the global COVID-19 pandemic. Would the experience be worth it, would it pay off both personally and academically, is it ethically acceptable? Looking back now, I would have loved to tell myself how great my spring semester at VIU would prove to be.

Lindsay Folland wasn't supposed to make it this far.

“When I was a child I was given a formal diagnosis that I would never be beyond an elementary school level,” she says. “I was told I am too socially impaired to have any meaningful relationships and I would need 24-7 support to bathe, dress, and eat.”

However, the people who told her these things, she says, were “thankfully and obviously not psychic."

Meet Annie Lehky, a second-year Culinary Arts student at Vancouver Island University (VIU) who has a passion for all things creative. She loves music, reading and writing short stories and poetry, and has recently started dabbling in painting as well. Annie has spent the last two years at VIU learning about what it takes to make it in the restaurant industry. She aspires to be an executive chef and plans to pursue a Red Seal in baking as well.

Are you wondering if a career in trades or applied technology is right for you? Careers in these fields can pay off in a big way – with as little as nine months of education. The labour outlook for these jobs remains strong, with more than 106,000 jobs expected to open up in just the trades, transport and equipment operators sector alone.

Vancouver Island University’s ‘su’luqw’a’ Community Cousins Aboriginal student mentorship program is celebrating its 10^th anniversary in September 2021. In honour of this important milestone, we are sharing stories of people closely connected with the program every month leading up to the anniversary. Stay tuned for a celebration of this important milestone in February 2022 – when we hope to be able to gather in-person.

Did you know that Vancouver Island University is one of four post-secondary institutions across Canada partnering on an educational initiative for Indigenous youth called EleV? This program, supported by the Mastercard Foundation and co-created with our Indigenous partners, aims to boost success by providing scholarships and wrap-around supports and removing barriers to accessing education.