What Being A Campus Ambassador Taught Me About Myself
When I got my acceptance letter to Berkeley last summer, I knew I wanted to take full advantage of the new environment that I was going to be in. Although, stepping out of one’s comfort zone is hard and while it was something I wanted to do mentally, physically putting myself out there was very difficult.
I’m not the most outgoing person. Don’t get me wrong, when I’m with my family or my friends I could be the loudest person in the room, but when I’m in a new environment without knowing anyone, I won’t talk and I’ll just keep to myself. I’ve gotten used to doing that to the point where sometimes awkward silence doesn’t feel awkward.
Being a campus ambassador was never on my radar, even after I accepted my offer of admission from Berkeley. Instead, it was more so something that I happened to have stumbled across my first week here during Calapalooza, also known as club rush. During club rush, all the clubs, organizations, and student groups on campus come together at Sproul to get new members to join.
I came across the Campus Ambassadors table and talked to the current ambassadors who were tabling about what this job was like and the responsibilities that came with it. The job very much intrigued me because there was about a week until the application was due. So, I spent that week deciding if I wanted to apply and when I did, I completed the application and sent it on its way.
About a day or two later, I got an email about the next step, which was the group interview. I’ve never experienced a group interview and I was very nervous about it. During a group interview, I wanted to make sure that I stood out to make an impression, but it was something that I was anxious about.
The group interview is a test of public speaking and collaboration and I’d like to say that I nailed it. Spoiler alert, I got the job.
One of the main aspects about this job is public speaking. We speak in front of a crowd, seeing how we are Berkeley’s tour guides to any visitors, prospective students, alumni, etc. It is our job to talk to people about the school, ourselves, and themselves.
It was never really the public speaking that I was scared of. I’ve had presentations throughout my academic journey, but they never required me to speak for 90 minutes, while walking backwards. We are trained to give the best possible tours with all the information and facts that we memorize and learn to share with our visitors. My goal when giving tours is to make the visitors as engaged as possible with what I am sharing, whether it is the mandatory information to my own story.
Giving tours means multi-tasking. There is a lot going on in my mind as I give my tours: the information to make sure that I didn’t miss anything, being engaging to the visitors, and projecting my voice loud enough for the entire group to hear.
At the beginning of our training period, I didn’t think that it was possible to do what we were told we’d be able to do. There were so many different elements that went into this job that I didn’t think I would be able to keep my head straight, but I did. The point is that I’ve succeeded and I’ve completed the training to become a fully fledged campus ambassador, even when I thought I wouldn’t be able to do it or we got to a part of training that I thought was a bit more daunting.
There are times when I feel I can’t do something or it doesn’t seem possible, especially when it comes to things that I’m not the most confident in doing. Although becoming a campus ambassador is something that I never saw myself doing, it is a job that I really enjoy and in the future when I look back at my time at Berkeley, being a campus ambassador will be a large chunk of that memory.
My advice to any who want to get out of their comfort zone: don’t overthink what could happen, but experience what will happen.