IS Assistant Review

As far as technical support jobs go, this was by far the best opportunity available due to the variety of work on offer. This ticked sooo many boxes on the CV, plus there was a sense of satisfaction when I came back to university and had already experienced all the basics of the final year.

The IS team were extremely welcoming and friendly. There were also many students there from different departments and we all socialised together on a regular basis. Also definately towards the end when a lot of people on site reported a problem, it was like you were just fixing a computer for a friend more than someone you worked with. IS personnel also came over from different areas of the globe occationally and I was included in some of the social outings. (e.g. one night we went go-karting, 3 people from our site, 2 people from america, and one person from singapore and that was followed by a night out with them all)

The amount of different departments within IS meant that there was always someone to contact in the event that you couldn't solve something, plus my manager was very supportive for the whole year.

It was strange because there were periods where it was extremely quiet and periods where it was extremely busy. At the beginning of the placement, and sometime when certain people went on holiday it did become a bit too busy however once I got better with time management and more technically experienced, this became a lot easier to deal with.

I was always given a lot of responsibility with the tasks I was responsible for. Also I became completely responsible for replacing laptops on one site and was extremely responsible for the replacement of laptops on the main site I worked on.

It was great to be back at university and have some experience in all of the final year modules I am undertaking. The professional skills will definitely stay with me forever.

If this wasn't during the recession then this would have definitely been a 10/10, however the atmosphere was extremely good even during the though times. Working in the same office as the student I was working with was good fun and livened up the atmosphere somewhat.

As this was a roll where placement students were used every year, it wasn't a placement where they didn't know what to do with me.

I had over a month with the previous students, which allowed them to teach us everything we needed to know which was good because I was extremely nervous when I started, I thought that I wasn't going to know enough. If something new was released or something was updated, I was given the relevant training to use the software/hardware.

It's a roll where the job was replaced with a new student each year. My manager was saying that he wanted a full time member to work with the students, however there was a recruitment freeze during my time and was still in place when I left the organisation.

We were out nearly every weekend (which is more than possible with derby being so cheap) as well as going to the cinemas on a regular basis. I also used to eat with a few of the students during lunch. There were plenty of students on site.

Derby is one of the cheapest places to live in the country. A night out was expensive if it went over £20 on a friday - saturday night. Rent was stupidly cheap (£45pp per week in a large 4 bed student house in the city centre with a drive)

Derby isn't renowned for its Nightlife and its a rare occasion when a big name artist arrives on the scene, but they do come and there's a large mix of different music that appeals to most people.

When visitors from other sites came over, there was normally an invitation to go out and once a month there was always a sports and social club event of some sort (examples were go-karting, lazer quest, munroe bagging in scotland for the weekend)