Sydney Ezekiel (#8) of Newfoundland-Labrador tries to work around Charlotte Kot (#11) of Saskatchewan while Cydney Auzenne provides back up.

Numerous opportunities abound for those TRU students wanting to acquire meaningful and practical experience either directly or indirectly related to their lines of study

With the Canadian Under-15 boys and girls basketball championships at the Tournament Capital Centre from Aug. 4-9, a good number got on board as paid or unpaid help. Either way, students were adding some great experience to their resumes that will undoubtedly pay off sooner rather than later.

How cool is that?

TONING THEIR RESUMES
TRU Marketing and Communications caught up with two students doing just that, and asked them about their participation.

Alix Stupich is in her fourth year of Bachelor of Social Work and Kali Ellis in her third year of a Bachelor of Science in Nursing. Both have been putting in long days at the stats tables, and while the experience isn’t directly related to their line of studies, both are having a great time

Stupich is involved as part of her employment with the TRU WolfPack Sports Camps and Ellis has been hired on for the event. Both hail from Vancouver Island, with Stupich from Ladysmith, BC and Ellis from Campbell River, BC.

Ellis, is expected to be a member of the 2009-10 WolfPack women’s basketball team.

Meanwhile, Stupich played for the WolfPack women’s basketball team up until last season when she made the tough decision to stop juggling varsity basketball and school to solely concentrate on school. That said, she wasn’t far from the court. Stupich was a regular at the stats desk during last season’s WolfPack home games.

Alix Stupich

Kali Ellis

QUESTIONS
Without further introduction, following are three questions posed to Stupich and Ellis:

TRU: Why are you helping out?

Stupich: “I really enjoy basketball and I like helping out when I canI got asked, and I said, “Sure.”

Ellis: “I’m helping out because they need a lot of people to be able to run a huge tournament like thisI play basketball for TRU, so it’s good to give back. Being a TRU player, it’s good to be at events like this “get your face out there. It’s good for the school.”

TRU: How does helping with this tournament apply to your studies?

Stupich: “I’m in social work, so it’s not professionally the same thing, but this is working with people.” (She illustrates by saying). “You have to be able to work with people and to be able to coordinate with other people.I have to be able to communicate with people who are on the same stats table, or on the same score table.I have to be able to get along with people.”

“If I don’t have good social skills as a social worker, I’m not going to succeed so it’s good to (do something like this) and keep working with others”.

Ellis: “Other than what Alix said “working on communication, being able to work with people in a team environment. Nursing is similar that way. When you work on a ward, you have a team and you need to have people skills. So, people skills mainly”

TRU: Biggest takeaway from helping with this tournament?

Stupich: “It feels good to help out the community. I get to watch some basketball and to see some of the young talent that’s coming inI get enjoyment out of it and I’m happy to help”.

Ellis: “I think it’s good to give back to the community once you’ve graduated or are almost done basketball.