Sarah Bollom

Intern for Grants Program and Skills Centre

Sarah Bollom – Intern for Grants Program and Skills Centre

My name is Sarah and I am a fourth year social work student from Sydney University.  After finishing yr 12 and completing my HSC, I took a year off to travel before starting my Social Work degree at Sydney University in 2002.  I chose Social Work as I have always wanted to work with people and wanted to make a positive and lasting difference to peoples’ lives.  I lived in the UK for 6 years during my early high school years and ever since then have been passionate about travelling and experiencing different cultures of the world. 

These interests combined to lead me to develop an interest in International Social and Community Development and consider the impact that policy changes at an International level have upon peoples’ lives in many different parts of the world.  I was excited to learn that I was going to be doing my 80 day Social Work placement at Oxfam IYP as it was an opportunity to discover how these issues are dealt with by an International agency such as Oxfam. 

Working at OIYP over the last few months has been amazing and a great opportunity to develop new skills and build on existing ones.  I have been involved in both the Skills and Grants program while at OIYP and loved interacting with the action partners and learning more about what issues they are facing in their communities. It is inspiring to work with the action partners of OIYP and learn about what they are doing in their communities and learn how we can work with them to achieve long lasting and positive changes. I’m looking forward to the rest of my time here and continuing to contribute to the work that OIYP is doing. I finish my formal time here in August but hope to stay involved as a volunteer and continue to be encouraged by the impact and changes that young people are making all over the world!  I finish my degree in October so I am looking forward to whatever job I may end up in!!