Brianna Guild and Cameron Chamberlain take home top honours
The 19th annual Co-operative Education Awards reception was held at Cutten Fields on Thursday, March 9 to acknowledge the hard work and the accomplishments of the University of Guelph’s co-op students.
The Co-op Student of the Year award recognizes the contributions of an individual in their academic achievement, workplace performance, extracurricular activities, and involvement within the community.
This year, the Co-op Student of the Year award in science and engineering was awarded to Brianna Guild.
Guild recently finished her last semester in the biochemistry co-op program. During her work term, Guild helped develop a procedure to culture human cells in physiological oxygen and also co-authored a published academic article.In addition, she has also been actively involved in the University of Guelph community. Guild contributed meaningful written pieces to the Peer Connect blog, developed content for the Co-operative Education and Career Services website, helped prepare presentations for prospective students, and was also actively involved in student orientation activities.
When asked how she managed her demanding schedule that consisted of a variety of volunteering commitments, work, and maintaining an excellent academic record, Guild said, “These involvements never felt like work because I spent the time meeting and helping people, and making friends. My extracurriculars provided some balance to my life, while also forcing me to effectively manage my time to meet deadlines for schoolwork. I have always had strong organization and time-management skills.”
In recognition of all of her contributions, Guild was also the recipient of the Collin Cureatz Memorial award.
This award is presented to a co-op student who has excelled academically, in their co-op, and as a dedicated volunteer in their community.
As for commerce and social and applied human sciences, the 2016 Co-op Student of the Year award was presented to Cameron Chamberlain.
Chamberlain is currently a fifth-year student in the management economics and finance co-op program and he was nominated by Edward McLaughlin of Fidelity Investments Canada.According to McLaughlin, “Cam participated fully in team meetings, consistently providing insightful ideas and feedback.”
In his role as a product research analyst, Chamberlain had helped develop and evolve Fidelity’s category review analysis and presentations. In addition, he created efficiency in making presentations, provided valuable input with his competitive analysis, and shared many ideas for product enhancements.
Chamberlain was also the first co-op student in the products and marketing department to be awarded the prestigious “You Earned It Award” for his great work on the Category Reviews and was also selected twice to create videos about his experience at Fidelity which will be used in presentations for future students.
When Chamberlain was asked if he had any advice for current or future co-op students, he stated that asking questions and making suggestions is key.“It’s important to remember that you’ve been hired for a reason. You bring a fresh set of eyes to every project or task that you’re working on. If you have an idea or questions about something that you’re working on, don’t keep it to yourself.”
Awards were also presented to Cole Engineering for the National Co-op Employer of the Year award and to the Uniacke Research Lab for the Guelph Co-op Employer of the Year award.
Photo courtesy of Kaitlyn Edwards.