By Estela Suarez
Three and a half years sure went by fast! I have been working at Smart About Money since my second semester of freshman year, and now I am about to graduate from UMass and close this chapter of my life. As part of this program, I have had the opportunity to learn, teach, grow, and lead. I have seen leadership changes, worked within two different departments, participated in campus-wide events, and been part of spaces within UMass that I wouldn’t have been able to otherwise. As part of my final blog post, I have decided to dedicate it to my Smart About Money co-workers. The ones who I currently work with, and the ones I have worked with in the past. You have all added to my life and taught me so much, and as I enter the “real” world I will take those lessons with me.
Having an on-campus job has been a small blessing in disguise. In the past four years, so much has happened personally, on campus, and even globally. Throughout it all, this job has provided me with a level of consistency and reliability that I didn’t even realize I needed. When the entire campus was sent home in March of 2020, all of my classes went virtual and many professors were scrambling to adapt to this new mode of teaching, not knowing what the next two years would bring. In a time of so much uncertainty, my bosses at SAM worked to make sure I could still work, get paid, and made sure to schedule regular meetings with me and the rest of the team to make sure we maintained as much “normalcy” as possible. Not to mention the fact that through our remote semesters our team experienced leadership changes, graduating seniors, and new additions to the team.
As the resident “non-financial” person on the team, I make a lot of jokes about not being “Smart About Money”. But, in reality, working at SAM has taught me a lot about finances and my own financial decisions. I have been made aware of things like the importance of saving for retirement and how to do so, the different factors that go into a credit score and how to maintain healthy credit, and the differences between a banking institution and a credit union, just to name a few. I still don’t have a working budget in place, but at least I know how to make one when the time comes.
All this being said, as I reflect on my time on this team, I am most thankful for the relationships I have made: the bosses turned mentors, the coworkers turned friends and everyone who has supported our team along the way. Making change is not a quantitative practice, it is something that requires a lot of time, patience, and creativity. This team has worked so hard and I could not be more proud of you all. I can’t wait to see all the great things you all do, whether it be at UMass or beyond. Thank you all for everything as I am forever grateful.