Alumni Spotlight - Carl Mercer
During his undergraduate studies at Memorial, Carl Mercer found
his passion doing various volunteer roles – on campus, in St.
John's and in South Africa. These experiences led him to concentrate
his political science studies on issues relating to the developing
world . After receiving his BA in 2005, he spent about nine months in
Ethiopia serving as the project manager for a food security project
run by CARE International.
"What you do in university is very different from what you do in the
field, but in university I learned how to work hard, and my role in
Ethiopia required a lot of research, so I had those skills," he
explains, adding that he was able to draw on anecdotes he'd heard
from seasoned professors, and from his own work experiences. He
credits those experiences with making him more employable. "Being
involved here as a volunteer, and working as a MUCEP student,
definitely stood out on my CV."
The Butlerville, NL native returned home for just a few weeks this
spring before he was hired by a relatively new organization called
Mentor Initiative, based in the UK. Now he's off again – this
time to help with rehabilitation and recovery projects in Banda Aceh,
Indonesia, which was devastated by the horrific tsunami that struck
in December, 2004.