Nearly there…

The last few months between the Canberra pre-departure briefings and leaving for Turkey have been unsurprisingly busy. There was a lot to juggle between getting through final assessments and exams, the Y20 preparation and of course planning my pre-summit travels!

Turkey's mineral water spa - Pamukkale "Cotton Castle"

On the Global Voices end, all of the Australian delegates have been working hard on our research papers and opinion articles. We’ve been lucky to receive 2 rounds of draft feedback from our Global Voices Co-ordinator, Nick Fabbri, and our Academic advisors Tristram Sainsbury and Mike Callaghan. The experience of these 3 contributors was invaluable in shaping my research to be more relevant and impactful.

During the development of my paper, I also found an International Science & Engineering conference that will be held in Istanbul 2 days before the Y20 summit and thought that it was too convenient to not apply! I was very excited to be accepted to present my research there, and have therefore also prepared a slightly adjusted version of my Y20 paper for publication – adding to the pre lift-off chaos!

Birds-eye view over Fethiye

On the external Y20 end, all G20 Youth delegates were assigned a Y20 email address and Yammer (professional social networking site) account. These, along with Facebook, have been used extensively to get to know delegates from around the world and pre-arrange social meet ups for before, during and after the trip. On the professional side, we were all active in putting forward our countries’ position on the main youth issues for Yammer discussion and then voting for the top agenda items. The three main headings within this are youth and education in the 21^st century, youth for peace and youth unemployment across technology and innovation. Given my interest and research into innovation, I am the Australian delegate in the last discussion group, although currently we are all contributing across the board. With 2 rounds of voting and in depth discussion, it is shaping up to be a really diverse and interesting agenda for negotiation at the actual Y20 summit in Istanbul shortly!

We have been receiving exciting updates about our itinerary for Turkey, which includes 2 full days of negotiation as well as communiqué development. We also have cultural day trips and evenings as well as a gala dinner event – I can’t wait!

The honeycomb hills of Cappadocia

Canberra Whirlwind

The next few weeks were a complete whirlwind and I'm still amazed by the crazy efficiency of the Global Voices and Co-op teams.

A couple of days after submitting my answers, I received a call from Global Voices for a short phone interview. This was fairly standard, and went over my application answers as well as a bit more detail on my research proposal. It also gave me an opportunity to ask a few questions about the process ahead.

In less than a week, on a Friday afternoon I received the incredibly exciting call that I had been selected! By the middle of the following week, I had been introduced via email to the other successful delegates and been sent my plane tickets and itinerary for the Canberra pre-departure briefing which was to take place the next week.

The schedule for Canberra was jam-packed and incredible but even that couldn't have prepared us all for the few days ahead. We started with a welcome greeting from The Hon. Peter Lindsay, Chair of the Global Voices Board of Directors and former Parliamentary Secretary for Defence, and were each given a box of personalized Global Voices Business cards for future networking. I got to know the other Y20 representatives, as well as Global Voices delegates heading to the OECD in Paris, the UN ECOSOC forum in New York, the Defence delegates and the Global Voices team over a welcome dinner and drinks.

The next two days were spent having meetings at Parliament House with diplomats including Shadow Treasurer, The Hon. Chris Bowen MP, Shadow Minister for Finance, The Hon. Tony Burke MP and an exclusive lunch in the Members & Guests Dining Hall with Mr Angus Taylor MP and Mr Ed Husic, MP. During this time we discussed Australia’s strategic goals for both Domestic and International Policy as well as our own research topics. We were also given a short ‘meet & greet’ question time with Prime Minister, The Hon. Tony Abbott MP and a behind-the-scenes tour of Parliament House by The Hon. Peter Lindsay. Our second evening was spent attending an inspiring UN dinner at the National Press Club with Minister for Foreign Affairs The Hon. Julie Bishop MP as the keynote speaker.

The Pre-Departure briefings gave all delegates more confidence for discussing Australia’s position on key issues on a global stage as well as a deepened sense of focus and some new angles for our research fellowships. It was truly an unbelievable couple of days and we all left completely exhausted but incredibly excited for the journey ahead.

Another Application?!

In just over 24 hours Co-op Program scholar Laura Sacks officially joins fellow delegates from around the globe in Istanbul for Y20 Turkey 2015.  Through this 4 part blog series Laura takes us on the journey with her from starting the application for the Co-op Global Policy scholarship through Global Voices to being on the ground in Istanbul...



In the midst of countless graduate job questionnaires, cover letters and thesis proposals I didn't think there was anything that could possibly make me fill in another application, but when I saw the Global Voices email from the Co-op Program, I knew I couldn't let this one slip away. A trip to Turkey to attend the G20 Youth Summit (Y20), complete with a pre-departure briefing trip to Parliament House in Canberra was an opportunity too incredible to be ignored.

So I set off to give it everything I had for this priceless experience. The application form involved only two questions, 500 words each. I thought that this would be a speedy process but it turns out perfecting 1000 words was really time consuming (especially for a borderline OCD Engineer...).

The first question focused on why I wanted to attend the summit and what I would bring to the Australian Delegation. I was careful that I didn't slip in “free trip to Turkey!” anywhere in my ‘why’ answer, and instead focused on gaining experience addressing ‘big picture’ strategic challenges from a global economic standpoint. The creative problem solving skills that my Engineering degree had provided and the valuable industry understanding I had gained through my Co-op placements were part of what I thought I could contribute to the summit.  In addition, I think it was key to address the teamwork, communication and networking aspects of the summit. Finally, I think it was important to recognize that this was not a one-off commitment, but would in fact open doors for implementing sustainable changes back home after Turkey.

The second question involved submitting a research proposal for the 4000 word Research Fellowship involved as part of the Delegation. The purpose of completing this research is that each delegate arrives in Turkey as a mini ‘expert’ on one area relevant to the Y20 and G20 discussions.  Considering that I had already taken on quite a lot of responsibilities for 2015, I aligned my proposed research to my Honors thesis topic to ensure I would have adequate time to dedicate to both. I was fortunate that my area of interest is around Innovation in the Global Energy sector, which is closely matched to the three core pillars of the G20 Turkish Presidency. I think that my research into the G20 priorities and agenda really helped make my application more relevant.

A lot of useful tips came from the Google Hangout organised by the Co-op Program and the Global Voices team. Although I was in Thailand at the time, I locked my friend out of the room and logged in to make sure I didn't miss any insights. FYI you don’t need your camera on to connect to this – it was not worth bringing a blazer to Thailand!! The Global Voices team mentioned reading the previous G20 and Y20 communiqués, as well as the research fellowships from past delegates. These really helped me gauge how specific and relevant my proposal needed to be.

After painfully cutting down each response I eventually managed to get my answers down to the word limit. I finally submitted as close to the midnight deadline as possible (does anyone ever submit anything before 11:50pm??) and headed off for some much needed sleep, dreaming of giant mounds of Turkish delight...