Young Canada Works — Success Story

Louise Pitre

Rebecca Britton working on an outdoor kids camp at the Penticton Art gallery. Photo — Rebecca Britton

The Young Canada Works (YCW) team at the Canadian Museums Association is always delighted to hear that a former (or a current) YCW youth participant has been offered a permanent position with the organization where their YCW position had taken place. Success comes in many forms but an offer of continued employment in the heritage sector is a highly sought-after outcome. We were so pleased, then, to hear from our contact with the Penticton Art Gallery when she let us know that she would be moving on from her position and that her replacement would be none other than the former YCW in Heritage Organizations (YCW-HO) student that she had previously supervised. Rebecca Britton, who has participated in both the Heritage Organizations and the Building Careers in Heritage streams of YCW is now in the fourth month of her permanent position as the Penticton Art Gallery’s Education and Programming Coordinator.

Rebecca Britton had participated in two YCW-HO positions at the Penticton Art Gallery that served as bookends to the final year of her Bachelor of Arts degree in English and Anthropology at the University of the Fraser Valley. In the Summer of 2020, Rebecca was selected as the YCW-HO “Creative Kids Program Leader” at the Penticton Art Gallery and the following Summer was able to secure a second YCW-HO position with the gallery’s Creative Kids Program. Her role involved developing and implementing an ongoing summer program “to serve the community’s youth and introduce them to a positive and creative arts experience.” She was tasked with developing a marketing plan, coordinating camp enrollment, securing materials and soliciting feedback from its participants. Rebecca was drawn to these YCW in Heritage Organizations positions at the Penticton Art Gallery “because this job would give [her] experience working with kids and as [she] was looking towards becoming a teacher” and wanted “as much experience working with kids as possible.” Rebecca had selected her major, English, and her minor, Anthropology, because they served her joint interests in teaching and working in a museum setting.

Rebecca Britton painting the outline for the PAG’s collaborative Bob Ross mural for the 2020 Bob Ross exhibit. Photo — Gord Goble for the PentictonNow

Shortly after her second YCW-HO position finished, she was able to transition into a YCW at Building Careers in Heritage (YCW-BCH) (the internship stream for post-secondary graduates) position with the nearby Summerland Museum as their Collections Intern for 2021-2022. Rebecca’s YCW-BCH internship supervisor, Petra Höller, had glowing words to describe the intern’s efforts at the Summerland Museum. In her role with the Summerland Museum, Rebecca “volunteered to develop a tour of a local cemetery during October.” The first two planned tours sold out and a third was added. Petra continued, “with these tours, we were able to attract local community members who had not connected with the museum before, and tourists from around the valley. It also acted as a source of revenue during a part of the year where the museum sees fewer in-person visitors.” In her end of work-term report, Petra noted some impressive statistics related to Rebecca’s work: “During the months that Rebecca was working as Collections Intern, we saw a 744% increase in visitorship from the previous year. Rebecca’s work developing the cemetery tours and assisting with the children’s programming contributed to that increase.” In addition to this impressive contribution, the Collections Intern was also responsible for reorganizing the collections’ storage space. In addition, she was able to accession well over a thousand items into the museum’s permanent collection and organize and run successful children’s camps during the Fall and Winter months. As her supervisor noted “without Rebecca’s help, we wouldn’t have been able to offer this educational programming to the community.” Petra observed that “Rebecca proved an invaluable part of the Museum team.”

When the internship with the Summerland Museum was nearing its end, Rebecca “was looking for a position that was a little more permanent and... stumbled upon a job posting at the gallery.” As it turned out, the position she had applied for was no longer open. However, her former supervisor was leaving the gallery and invited Rebecca to interview for her position of Education and Programming Coordinator a position which aligns tightly with Rebecca’s interests. In the words of Rebecca, “I of course said an enthusiastic yes! I like to say that I got promoted and I now have the boss’s position, since I now hire and oversee the summer students that I once was.” Rebecca was hired full-time into this position in March, just as her YCW-BCH internship was coming to a close.

Penticton Art Gallery, where Rebecca now works. Photo — Penticton Art Gallery

I asked Rebecca to tell me a little bit about what she is working on in her new position and she replied: “I am so happy with my job. I love the variety that my days offer me — some days I am working with preschoolers, sometimes with teens, other times with kids or adults. When I am not running a program, I am planning a program, or setting up for an exhibit or event. Although I’m all over the place in what I do, the foundation for the main portion of my job was very much laid while I was a summer student — while in that position, I had to plan activities, source materials, and reach out to community members and that is a large portion of what I now do — just on a larger scale.” It is gratifying to hear that the Young Canada Works program helps develop sought after job skills and helps students and youth determine which career paths they want to pursue. Rebecca continues: “the summer student position at the gallery was totally a foot in the door for me— without the connections and experience that working as the art gallery summer student gave me, I definitely wouldn’t have found a job that is as fulfilling and outright fun as this one is. I am so glad that I applied through YCW to be a summer student at the gallery — it has led to a wonderful opportunity which has in turn led to even more opportunities. I tell everyone I can about YCW and summer student positions because you never know what amazing things will come from applying.” When asked about her future plans and whether she still plans to pursue a career in teaching, Rebecca replied: “I would like to pursue my Bachelor’s of teaching eventually and then possibly start teaching English and Art at a high school level — but as of right now I am very happy with where I am, so I plan on being here for a while.” I have no doubt that that Penticton Art Gallery is very fortunate to have Rebecca on their team for the long term.

We love to hear that our students and intern participants not only developed skills and contributed positively to their organizations but we especially enjoy hearing that they are able to find employment in the heritage sector following their work term. This brief account of Rebecca’s experiences with YCW illustrate how the program fulfills one of its goals to be mutually beneficial, benefiting the youth employee as much as it benefits the organization where they work. These benefits naturally spill out into the wider community who are able enjoy the fruits of the museum workers’ labours, be that enhanced public programming or a better organized and more accessible collection. Rebecca’s experiences also illustrate how participation in Young Canada Works can help prepare museum workers for the realities of museum work, where there is an expectation that one will wear many hats and fulfill a variety of roles. Rebecca is an excellent example of someone who brings enthusiasm paired with a high skill level and professionalism. Her work at both the Penticton Art Gallery and the Summerland Museum are an example of Young Canada Works at its finest. I wish her all the best with her future career whether it be in museums, teaching, a combination of the two or something entirely different. I hope that skills developed during her YCW work terms will continue to serve her well in the years to come.

Louise Pitre is a Young Canada Works Program Officer with the Building Careers in Heritage Stream and the YCW Communications Liaison for the Canadian Museums Association.