EP caught up with Yetunde Arowora, an MSc Healthcare Management student, who has been completing a Project Placement with the Public Health Directorate at Medway Council.
Medway Council offers an ongoing training course to staff working in local public services called ‘Making Every Contact Count’. The course helps public service staff to feel more confident about discussing health and wellbeing in everyday conversations that they have with members of the public and clients, and to be able to sign post local support services to them – the overriding aim is to support local people in making positive changes to their physical, mental health and wellbeing. For Yetunde’s project placement, she was tasked with analysing the data from recent course evaluation forms to pick out best practices and make recommendations for change in the delivery of the course for next year.
Yetunde is hoping to start a career in public health management, so this was a very welcome opportunity for her to get in depth experience in this area and she found getting involved with this particular project really useful for developing her work-based skills. She has thoroughly enjoyed working at Medway Council, the team having a really great working environment with lovely people, where they seemed genuinely interested in her learning and development. Yetunde was given plenty of opportunity to network, both within the Department itself, as well as with colleagues elsewhere in the council, which will certainly serve her well for her future career plans.
The Public Health Directorate would certainly be looking forward to working with students on placement opportunities moving forward, with Peter Macauley, the Workforce Training and Programmes Manager, commenting that the EP scheme has always provided them with applicants of excellent quality. He commented that Yetunde herself has been an excellent placement student this year, picking up everything really fast and using her skillset to think about the courses more broadly and with a fresh perspective, and has really helped to make some positive changes to what they offer.
If you’re thinking about getting involved with the EP scheme this year, follow Yetunde’s advice and get involved right away! As she remarked, “there is so much to learn and so many activities to pique your interests, and it is great to be able to talk with your classmates about all of the things that you have been getting involved with”.
Get involved and get rewarded today, with Employability Points!
Find out more about Public Health at Medway Council here.