This month’s Kent Star is Grace Ingram, who organised and led a “Mixed Roots” event to help individuals discuss their experiences of coming from multiple and undefined cultural and ethnic backgrounds, celebrating these often-overlooked identities. Hear from Cultural Connector Grace:

“Hi, I’m Grace Ingram. I’m doing an MSc in Conservation Project Management. I’m part of the Postgraduate Network and I work at Oaks Nursery on campus. A fun fact about me is I have a playlist for everything. I love music! I played viola and violin for 11 years. Music is still a big part of my life, even beyond classical compositions, which I mostly just listen to when I’m studying or working on assignments. When I’m angry I listen to rap and when I’m energized I listen to Golden Oldies Motown. There’s a song for every mood!”

Can you tell us about the “Mixed Roots” project?

” ‘Mixed Roots’ was an informal conversation with individuals coming from multiple and undefined cultural and ethnic backgrounds speaking on their experiences. Panellists from four main backgrounds (diaspora communities, biracial individuals, Third Culture Kids, and adoptees) answered various questions in a relaxed on-stage atmosphere. I organised the event and also spoke on my experiences as a transracial international adoptee.

The event was a ‘fishbowl’ discussion – fishbowls are frequently called the ‘unconference’. Unlike traditional panels that prioritise making the audiences feel comfortable, fishbowls encourage the audience to suspend their own feelings and rationale to listen with the intention of understanding, rather than responding.

This event was made possible due to the generosity of the Graduate and Researcher College’s Postgraduate Community Experience Awards. However, this event was created because of the vast amount of people falling into these plural and undefined identities, but the lack of collective representation for them here on campus and in broader society. ‘Mixed Roots’ presented an opportunity to listen and humanize individuals with conflicting identities and conflicting senses of community— taking the conversation beyond that evening.

Following the event, we collected general feedback from audience members:

• 78% of respondents said prior to Mixed Roots they had not been provided with opportunities to learn about these backgrounds at Kent.
• 100% of respondents said they would like more opportunities to learn about and celebrate ‘mixed roots’ with many interested in incorporating various topics into the discussion alongside race and culture including: gender & sexuality; religion & faith; politics; pop culture & current events; & mental health.

Many respondents also expressed an interest in seeing additional collaborations with future mixed roots events with: LGBTQ+ Network/ Society; A specific racial/ethnic society; Women’s Network; Faith Network; International Network; Accessibility Network; Student Support and Wellbeing.

This feedback points us in the right trajectory regarding future ‘Mixed Roots’ events which is very exciting!”

What advice would you give to other students?

“A piece of advice I would give is that the one of the best ways you can invest in yourself is by investing in community. I think these investments can take place in many forms whether attending listening events like ‘Mixed Roots’, participating in university or community service projects, or getting involved in social justice campaigns. I think even more can be said when we choose to invest in diverse communities— communities different from our own— in regards to race, nationality, gender, sexuality, socio-economic status, etc.”

What are you plans for this year?

“I graduated from university this past May and will finish this Conservation Project Management MSc in September. While I’ve enjoyed my studies so far, but I’d like to do some learning beyond the classroom. Community service is a huge passion of mine, so I’m currently looking at taking a gap year or two with a credible humanitarian/service organisation like the Peace Corps or AmeriCorps. Living abroad in the UK has been an enriching experience. I’d love to serve in a different city, state, or country, if possible.  I believe that community service will only strengthen my future career in conservation.”

Learn more about the Kent Stars campaign.

This month, we’re celebrating Inspiring Intern Sami, who stood out to our Employability Points Team for his enthusiasm and dedication to undertaking skill developing co-curricular activities. Sami gained his internship at Reflect Digital through our Employability Points scheme. Hear from Sami:

“I’m Sami Bakaitis and I’m a final year student studying Classics with Italian. I love to travel to unique places and make the most of my time there, such as farming on a volcano in Sicily. Fun fact, I traversed through the Vietnamese jungle at the age of 16! My interests change frequently but I always enjoy going for a run so I can clear my head and keep fit.”

Tell us about your time at Reflect Digital.

“After a skills workshop with Becky Simms, I learnt that the Employability Points scheme was offering students with enough employability points the opportunity to apply for an internship at her company Reflect Digital. As a result, I joined as many sessions that applied to me and undertook extra-curricular activities that would get me extra points, such as starting a blog or updating my LinkedIn profile. Many points later, I was finally able to apply for the internship, ace the interview, and begin my journey with Reflect Digital!

The internship was intense but in the best way possible. The team at Reflect are considerate and always made sure that I was happy with the work I had been assigned. Even though I worked primarily on SEO, I was exposed to many other sectors such as PPC and social media advertising.

From the very first day I was immersed in a transparent workplace that felt relaxed yet always moving. My work consisted of learning the ins and outs of SEO through thorough research and quizzing my colleagues. After a week, I was set copywriting tasks and keyword research for clients. Copywriting involved following a detailed brief and writing a piece of content for the client while following SEO guidelines to help the article rank well. Although there was a numerous amount of copywriting tasks, I did enjoy writing them as the topics were wildly different such as writing content on how often you should replace your mattress to the benefits of cloud computing!

I was sad to go at the end of the internship as I still have one more year to finish at university, but it did give me a lot of confidence in my future career path and skills which I transferred into my uni presentations and assignment research methods.”

What advice would you give to other students? 

“Advice I would give to other students is that having a routine is paramount if you want to achieve your goals as it creates free time to be more productive. Dedicating meaningful time to learning a new skill is the best way to explore new career paths. I highly recommend taking an online course to get a surface understanding of the subject and seeing if it is something that you might enjoy. Moreover, mindfulness is a great way to recentre yourself if you keep feeling stressed from all the work. I joined the Mindfulness society here at Kent during lockdown in 2021 and it was the best decision ever!”

What are your plans for the next year?

“I will be taking an exciting role at Reflect Digital in early April as a PPC Analyst. This varying job will push me to explore new areas of digital marketing and learn a range of useful skills. One of my goals for the future is to start my own digital marketing company, and I believe that this role will help me work towards this goal.”

Learn more about the Kent Stars campaign.

We have some amazing students at Kent and we want to celebrate them with our new Kent Stars campaign. Filipa is our Kent Star this month, recognised for her inspiring work on the ‘Consent. Get It. Full Stop.’ campaign. Hear from Consent Champion Filipa:

“I’m Filipa Paes, and I’m about to wrap up the final year of my Law degree at Kent. Despite thoroughly enjoying my law degree I sometimes wonder whether I shouldn’t be studying Philosophy instead. But I guess, when it was time to choose, Law won – perhaps because of my interest in social change.”

Tell us about ‘Consent. Get it. Full stop.’ What is it and how did it come about? 

“After presiding over the student group UKC Respect the No in 2019/2020, I joined forces with the University of Kent to create the ‘Consent. Get It. Full Stop.’ campaign, a university-wide project that aims to cultivate and strengthen a culture of consent in our community.

Consent and sexual violence are complex topics to bring into conversations – often raising eyebrows and producing uncomfortable smiles. This feeling of ‘killing the vibe’ in the conversation stops many from getting involved and even standing up in situations where others are in danger. In the last year, however, following the murders of Sarah Everard and Sabina Nessa, we have witnessed an increasing number of people discussing this challenging subject. Amongst other things, these murders are reminders that sexual violence is a problem and that we should put all our efforts into tackling this issue in our society, regardless of the degree of violence and extremism in each case and the amount of media (and social media) attention received.

With the launching of this consent campaign, we hope to shift the culture. By placing sex-positive messaging at its forefront and having student feedback as one of its chief ingredients, we invite all students and staff to participate in the conversation in any way they can. We want everyone to feel confident in their understanding of consent, how to practise it (without making it awkward!) and how to be active bystanders.

In the last few months, I’ve been working closely with Becky Wyatt, the University’s Specialist Adviser for Sexual Assault and Harassment. Together, we have talked to dozens of students, gathered their feedback and provided them with a forum to raise their concerns. We have been actively working on increasing transparency and accessibility by ensuring the University’s procedures, policies and expectations regarding sexual misconduct and assault are made clear and accessible to all. We have also increased the promotion of the specialist support for victims/survivors of sexual violence offered both within and outside the university so that everyone can get support and feel as safe as possible. The University’s internal support has also been made easier to access with the new reporting tool, Report + Support.

It has been an immense pleasure to work alongside Becky, and so many other great people across the University on this project and to see so many in our community – no matter their position at the University – getting involved.”

What advice would you give to other students?

“If I had to give anyone any piece of advice it would be to be perseverant (though others might put it as ‘stubborn’ or ‘annoying’) if you genuinely believe in a project’s potential to bring about change. This perseverance does need to come with full understanding that – in true consent fashion – you will hear loads of nos.  Oh, and a pretty good skill to master is the ability to put together a sound logical argument! Driving change takes a lot of persuasion, convincing and arguing (and no quarrelling).”

What are your plans for the next year?

“As my three eventful years at Kent come to an end, I look forward to dedicating myself fully to philosophy. Though it might appear wholly detached from the notion of consent and the campaign, ‘consent’ is very much about communication (verbal or otherwise), which is my main interest. I’m remarkably interested in how we communicate with each other and use language. As such, I plan on continuing my studies and research in the philosophy of law and language, with the ultimate goal of helping us understand each other a bit better!”

Do you know an inspiring Kent student or student group? Let us know. 

Learn more about the Kent Stars campaign.