You never know who is watching

Some time after finishing my MSc, I came across a few familiar faces on BPP's website, social channels and student election campaigns. One of them was mine. It sent me straight back to the busiest and best years of my student life.

Alongside the MSc I held two roles. As a Student Ambassador I welcomed new students, helped them navigate their first days, organised events and represented the university on official occasions. As a Student Voice Representative I carried student concerns to staff and worked to make sure the people making decisions heard the people living with them.

I took both roles thinking I was there to help others. Looking back, the person who changed most was me. I learned to communicate with people I had never met, to stand up in rooms I felt junior in, and to step out of a comfort zone I had spent years furnishing. The confidence I use every day now was built in those hours between lectures.

Show up. Contribute. You never know who is watching.

Here is the thing about contribution: it compounds invisibly. Nobody tells you at the time that the event you helped run, or the feedback you carried upstairs, is being noticed. The recognition arrives later, in forms you could not have predicted, sometimes on the university's own website. Visibility is not the reason to get involved. It is the interest paid on involvement you gave for its own sake.

That experience follows me into assessment work. When results land and a student somewhere is refreshing a portal with their heart in their mouth, I remember being on the other side of the desk. The person processing your marks once sat where you sit. Student-first is not a slogan to me. It is a memory.

So to any student weighing up whether to get involved: the hours will not fit neatly around your deadlines, and you will do most of it unthanked. Do it anyway. Your future self is in the audience.