Hello, I’m Jody and in July I began my six month student placement here at Northumberland Wildlife Trust.

Having been on placement for over four months I decided now is a good time to begin to share and reflect on my experiences so far. But first I would like to introduce myself and my placement!

I’m currently studying Geography at Northumbria University, and this placement is part of my “sandwich year” before my final year of studies. I am interested in all things outdoors, in particular hiking and plants.

Through my studies at university, I cover a diverse range of topics including glaciers, coasts, geology and, my personal favourite, ecology. I enjoy gaining knowledge and skills across a broad variety of fields. However, I realised early into last year my interests are more directed towards conservation and management.

I worried that, due to the breadth of my degree, when beginning to look for employment I may be lacking experience in conservation. Luckily, my placement year has given me the perfect opportunity to build up these skills and I was thrilled to take on a conservation placement with Northumberland Wildlife Trust.

My main goal during this placement is simply to gain as much experience as possible in different areas across the trust. Whilst gaining lots of valuable skills I also hope to discover my main areas of interest in conservation.

I work within the Nature Recovery Team where I have been made to feel very welcome, both by colleagues and office dogs! However, most of my days are spent out of the office working alongside different teams. So far the majority of my work has involved; assisting with estates management alongside volunteers, surveying peatland, assisting a nature well-being course, helping with events and tree maintenance and surveys.

I am thoroughly enjoying all my work and keeping very busy. Seeing how passionate all the staff and volunteers are about their work is incredibly motivating.  In further blogs I will be sharing details of my experiences working with different teams.

More to come soon, Jody.