When Hannah learned about a volunteer opportunity with Neil Squire at a job fair at UBC, where she was studying psychology, she had no idea it could play a pivotal role in her career. Having been a former swim instructor, she enjoyed teaching and became interested in becoming a Distance Computer Comfort tutor, helping people with disabilities learn valuable computer skills.

“It was such a rewarding experience doing swim instructing,” she explains. “I just like the feeling of giving someone a skill they’ve always wanted to learn.

“I wanted to expand my experience at the time [as a tutor], and then it ended up being something I really, really liked.”

Under the guidance of Distance Learning Coordinator Gordon Watt, Hannah began tutoring Distance Computer Comfort participants.

“I had my first client, I thought we honestly made a bit of a friendship by the end, always checking in on each other through email, so I loved giving her that sense of confidence and seeing the progression,” she explains. “Just seeing that from the beginning when she was very hesitant about computers in general, and by the end she was sending me memes, GIFs, and stuff, so that was really cool to see.”

Hannah remembers being amazed when after teaching the basics of PowerPoint, the participant took the initiative on their own to master the program and make a beautiful presentation that took several hours to put together.

Another Distance Computer Comfort participant she tutored found employment thanks to the computer skills they learned.

Through her time volunteering as a tutor, Hannah learned a lot.

“It taught me a lot about having patience with people and learning what their learning styles are, and from there being flexible on what your teaching style will be based on your relationship,” she shares. “That has definitely helped me a lot, trying to be as flexible as possible, being very individualized, knowing that each person is completely different in how they learn.”

And the skills have translated seamlessly into her current line of work. After graduating with her Psychology degree, Hannah started working with posAbilities (new window) as their Social Media Lead.

posAbilities provides a broad range of services to persons with developmental disabilities and their families, serving over 1,200 people in Metro Vancouver and the rest of BC.

As Social Media Lead, Hannah has been running a program called the Social Media Fellowship. After creating a hands-on curriculum, she now offers people with disabilities the opportunity to take part in social media courses. The aim isn’t necessarily to become an influencer, but to learn skills to use social media personally and professionally. But the possibilities are truly endless. Given the power of the Internet, one of her fellows may just become the next big social media star!

The first four-month course Hannah taught with posAbilities, “Social Media Exploration”, covered a diverse range of social media skills and content creation. Currently, she is running the “Social Media Mastery” course, where participants are working together and individually to create an online brand, develop online networks and communities, and curate meaningful content. The course also sees them develop a social media campaign from scratch.

Hannah credits her time volunteering as a Distance Computer Comfort for Neil Squire with giving her valuable skills that have made the difference in her current job.

“I was really grateful for the opportunity. I worked with Gordon, he initially took me on, and he’s been really great, and I worked with Khatidja also, and they were both super helpful with Neil Squire, and gave me so many life skills, not just for this job but even for the future. And I think their whole philosophy around giving people technology is so, so important,” she says.

“Just because someone doesn’t have an email or doesn’t have a social media account, doesn’t necessarily mean they don’t want one, it just means they need the skills to create it.”

You can follow the Social Media Fellowship and their activities on Instagram: @social.media.fellows (new window).