Introducing: Lourdes Zelaya
Title: Assessment Advisor
Lourdes Zelaya has worked with diverse client groups in both academic and community settings. Prior to working as an Assessment Advisor at George Brown College she has worked in the social service field for over 5 years. When she returned from the JET program in 2005, her career path began at the YMCA working as a Language Assessor for newcomers to Canada and transitioned to Resource Specialist supporting individuals in search of employment. Interest blossomed in this area and moved on to work as a Mentoring Counsellor at Skills for Change, coordinating mentoring partnerships for internationally trained teachers and students taking LINC (Language Instruction for Newcomers to Canada) classes. In her current role as an Assessment Advisor she evaluates essays for admission/placement testing, administers an English language assessment, and advises students on their testing results.
Advice:
Social Services
Within the Social Service field, the experience developed in Japan provides many transferrable skills that could be applied in the area of youth programming and working with newcomers to Canada. Additional qualifications and/or experience may be required but through volunteering, experience could be acquired and potentially attaining the opportunity at a position.
Overall, volunteering is an excellent way to explore different areas of interest, gain additional experience, network, and potentially present your expertise.
College
Within the college different types of positions can be explored. Although preference is given to qualified full-time employees, some postings do go externally when a suitable candidate is not found. Another possibility is considering part-time or seasonal employment as an approach to gain additional experience and feel for the environment.
For more information about the Career Roundtable, please click here.