Outside of The Comfort Zone

Stepping out of your comfort outside can be liberating but daunting at the same time. Let alone leaving your hometown of Shanxi, China, to come to a foreign country like Australia to finish off a Commerce degree seems out of the question. Yet, against all odds, Ziggy Hao was able to do that! A person familiar with adventure and discovery, she pushes herself to see the rest of the world on her own accord!

"Before coming to Melbourne, I volunteered at a primary school in Cambodia for two months as a teacher. After that, I worked for a?'start-up' whose main goal was to promote traditional Chinese culture. At the same time, I did half my bachelor degree in China."

She quickly learnt that one of the few ways to secure a job in Australia was participating in extracurricular activities instead of just getting good grades, which was usual in China.

Ziggy first encountered Practera when she heard from a senior student in 2019 about their live projects. She wanted to get local exposure to the Australian workforce and enhance her employability.

?"Two years ago, when I started my Bachelor's degree at Monash University, I heard about the program through senior students who highly recommended it. The goal was to provide international students to gain local industry experience and strengthen ."

"The reason I was attracted to the program was that most international students at this stage have no local experience. It was then and there; I applied for the Practera Live project. I learnt a lot. I had the support of our mentor working with other teammates. I also learnt how to coordinate and connect with my client. Skills that are essential for the workforce."

Her second encounter with Practera was when she became Study Melbourne's Student Ambassador, now studying her Masters of Information Technology at the University of Melbourne. She was presented with an opportunity to participate in a live project again when she shared her experience at the Melbourne Employability Accelerator (M.E.A.) welcome workshop.

"I was given a chance to participate in the Practera Live projects during the second lockdown. This time I was more familiar with the client as it was Study Melbourne".?

"During this project, I interviewed the Programs Director, Hayley Bolding because Practera was one of the project's stakeholders and they were designing a paid internship model for the client to deploy to international students."

"Because of my interview with Hayley and involvement in this project, I started to understand how Practera works and why they were passionate about student employability, which I find pretty incredible."

As she continued her work as a Study Melbourne Ambassador, she encountered Lu, Practera's Projects Coordinator. They discussed all things International Students and their well-being and employability. Lu recognised Ziggy's passion for enhancing employability for International students. Ultimately, she got back to her on an opportunity at Practera which she accepts, graciously.

Currently, Ziggy is a Practera program coordinator intern and is working part-time in her role. Her primary responsibilities is moderating the WeChat account and communicating with International offshore students who are interested in the Melbourne Employability Accelerator (M.E.A.) and other programs.

?The goal was simple for Ziggy when she chose Melbourne as her study destination: to take a small step out of her comfort zone and enter a world of opportunities.