Students Volunteering for mutual wins

Volunteers are the lifeblood of Connect Health & Community - friends of the organisation who share their precious time and experience to help us deliver vital services. 

But there is another group of volunteers who help us help our community – volunteer students, who bring the latest learning and practices to help us perform at our best and support to those who need us.

In August, Australia celebrated National Student Volunteer Week, recognising the impact that student volunteers make through their contributions.

CEO, Amanda Murphy said Connect Health & Community has benefited from having the students supporting the organisation over the past six months, after joining the organisation as part of student placement, then deciding to stay as volunteers.

“Student volunteers make a major impact in the communities and causes they support. By lending a hand and sharing the latest learnings, they both create necessary change and gain professional knowledge. And through volunteering, student volunteers make lifelong social and professional networks with people who share their passions and interests.

Connect Health & Community’s student volunteers, Akshat, Peter and Likhit are all data scientist postgraduate students who started with Connect Health & Community in March this year.  

During their time with the organisation they have combined their computer science, modelling, statistics and maths skills to support initiatives of our business improvement manager.

“Akshat, Peter and Likhit have helped create several business improvement dashboards to help us better understand our processes and how we can improve our activities. This has given us significant improvement with reduced investment, from an industry that has a shortage of professionals,” Ms Murphy said.

But like all volunteering, Ms Murphy said there were great mutual benefits from the engagement.

“And while this undoubtedly provides benefit to us, the students are also benefitting from being able to apply their knowledge on real industry challenges, while gaining work experience related to their careers,” she said.

Akshat, Peter and Likhit said the professional experience they gained will help shape their future career opportunities, while the friendships they made will help them feel connected for life.