Meet Our Fellows Blog Series: Jamison Edwards

Jamison works with retired civic leader and enFocus mentor Gary Gilot.
Gary Gilot enFocus mentor and civic leader shares knowledge with Jamison throughout his Fellowship. 

Born and raised in Louisville (Luh-a-vul), Kentucky, that is where I call home. I also graduated from the University of Louisville with my BA in Economics. In high school, I had the opportunity to serve as the Youth Board President for a local nonprofit deaf oral school in my hometown. I was incredibly fortunate as in this role, I got my first glimpse of what I wanted to do for a career. Well, that's not exactly true. But I did learn that I loved being on a team and that I was motivated by the sense of fulfillment I could gain from helping others. Fast forward to last winter; I graduated from college and had to figure out how my skill sets developed throughout my childhood and in college could translate to the real world. To some extent, I was unfortunate in my internship experiences. I truly enjoyed all of my internships and could have seen myself working in that field upon graduation. Although I was appreciative of my positive experiences, they did little to help me narrow down my list of possible life and career trajectories.

Luckily, I found enFocus and South Bend through a childhood friend turned coworker from Louisville. After learning more about the nonprofit, it became clear what I wanted to do. Maybe not full time, but for as long as my 2-year Fellowship allows. I wanted to work at an organization that is focused on helping others while gaining a better understanding of how my skill set fits into the workforce. Along the way and through a multitude of experiences at enFocus, I still haven’t found a type of job or task I couldn’t see myself doing long term. However, I can say that the variety of opportunities has allowed me to have a clearer picture of the ones I may like a bit upon completing my Fellowship. When my Fellowship ends, I will have not only a better understanding of my career aspirations and a new set of skills to drive me closer to those aspirations.

Learn more about the 2020-2022 enFocus Fellows weekly in our Meet Our Fellows Blog Series.