By Emma King
Kayla Gladyzs is the type of girl who lights up the room the instant she walks in. Her personality and easy-going demeanour makes her one of Ryerson’s many friendly faces.
Kayla, 18, is going into her second year at the Ryerson School of Journalism. Originally from Caledonia, a small town in Southern Ontario, Kayla enjoys the fact that she gets to live in a big city where no one knows her name.
“It’s really lovely to be able to decide if I want to be super social or if I want to be myself,” she says. “I can choose to sit on the subway and make eye contact with everyone around me, make small talk with person beside me, or make a face at the little kid who’s looking at me. Or, if I’m having a bad day, it’s very easy to just put my headphones in and disappear.”
Although Kayla is enjoying herself now, her transition into Ryerson didn’t go as smooth as planned. “In elementary school and high school it never was really difficult for me to do well and get work done,” she said. “Coming here, it was very different. I realized for the first time I wasn’t going to understand everything right away and that really scared me.”
Kayla found solace in venting her problems and worries to friends and family. “In reality, everyone feels the same. It just takes some time to settle in.”
After graduating, Kayla is interested in exploring her career options outside of journalism. “I know this is a competitive program and I’m proud to be in it, but I know that I don’t want to be standing in front of a camera with a microphone,” she says.
Kayla loves to look at a variety of blogs, and would be interested in pursuing a career as an artistic director at a magazine.
Having recently completed her first year at Ryerson, Kayla had a piece of advice to give to all incoming freshman students. “Listen. Listen to everything, every day, all the time. Listen more than you speak.”
She goes on to say, that by following this, you will learn valuable information that will not only help you just at Ryerson but in life as well.
“Just remember that there are so many people that are willing to help,” she says. “This is just the beginning. There are lots of places that you can go from here.”
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