Goodbye and Hello

Every traineeship must come to an end and the time has come for Creating Natural Connections Trainee, Katie to hand in her metaphorical badge and say goodbye. But this is not the end of her time with Cumbernauld Living Landscape. In fact it is just the beginning. Say hello to Senior Project Officer Katie Brown:

For those of you who don’t know me, let me reintroduce myself. My name is Katie, (the project’s resident corvid (crows, rooks, etc) fanatic) and I am delighted to announce that I am the new Unlocking Community Capacity Officer. I will be taking over the running of the Nature Ninjas volunteers, a wonderful group who I got to know well throughout my traineeship. The Nature Ninjas are not afraid of a hard graft and their dedication to conservation is inspiring. I look forward to continue working with them.

I’m so grateful for my traineeship and all I have learned from my amazing colleagues. My traineeship was far from a normal one thanks to a certain global pandemic, but I admired how my team pulled together and continued to engage with the local community through online nature chats, weekly activity booklets, social media posts and videos to keep people’s spirits up throughout the very difficult winter lockdown.

From a former trainee to the next, my advice is enjoy every minute as your traineeship will fly in. Be prepared to step outside your comfort zone which will be scary at times but everything gets easier with practice and you’ll never regret pushing yourself to try something new. For me the days of being a carefree trainee are over but I look forward to continuing to work on the project and leave behind a strong legacy in the town where I grew up.