It took just a few weeks for Arya to realise that her IT degree wasn’t what she was expecting. When she took the leap in a new professional direction, everything fell into place.
When Arya Lohar started her first semester at university, she had big plans for a career in IT. She started at UTS as a Bachelor of Information Systems Bachelor of Business student, thinking that a business qualification would add extra depth to future IT roles.
But when classes started, she quickly realised that software engineering wasn’t the right fit. Even though she was working as hard as she could, she didn’t feel connected to the subject matter and was struggling to get her head around the course material.
To her surprise, her business classes were a different story.
“I was really enjoying my business subjects, so I thought maybe this is something that I'm more interested in and something that I should pursue further,” she says.
“I had just done some of my accounting subjects and I was doing extremely well in them. I got really high marks for both, and I loved to stay back, ask extra questions and try to really understand the content.”
Her teaching team recognised her commitment: in her second year of study, Arya was invited to join the UTS Business Mentors, a program that invites high-performing business students to provide advice and support to their peers in a classroom setting. It was the confirmation she needed that a business degree was the way forward.
Arya Lohar with Professor Carl Rhodes, Dean of UTS Business School, receiving a UTS Business Mentorship Award 2024
By her third year, Arya had made the switch into a Bachelor of Business with a major in Management. She was back on track, and her experience with the Business Mentors program had also inspired her to start seeking out other opportunities for personal and professional growth.
Over the next couple of years, she threw herself headfirst into the countless opportunities that are on offer for students at UTS. She signed up for UTS SOUL, a social justice and leadership initiative that sees students applying their knowledge to community challenges, and UTS BUILD, a leadership program that connects students to local and global opportunities to build their leadership skills.
“With UTS SOUL, I started volunteering at the Cancer Council as an admin person for their Australia’s Biggest Morning Tea fundraising campaign,” she says.
“UTS BUILD provided me with training about the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals. I didn’t know much about them prior, but the experience made me realise how important these goals are. I can now use that knowledge in different contexts, including in my university assessments.”
Through UTS BUILD, Arya also discovered the university’s Global Short Programs, which give students access to travel opportunities as part of their studies.
Despite some initial nerves about travelling alone, Arya eventually settled on a two-week exchange to Nottingham Trent University in the UK where she found herself instantly immersed in a global community of peers.
“I wondered, am I going to be able to do this by myself? And I think that was an experience of its own because I felt very accomplished by the end of it,” she says.
“It was one of the most life-changing experiences I’ve ever had.”
Arya Lohar went on a two-week exchange to Nottingham Trent University in the UK
Apply, win, rinse, repeat
By any measure, Arya has made the most of her time on — and beyond — the UTS campus. Collectively, she says all these activities have been invaluable to her degree experience: they’ve helped her make friends around the world, as well as to think about and apply her learning in a range of work and community contexts.
Now in the final year at UTS, you could forgive her if she opted to just coast to the finish line, but that’s clearly not the Arya Lohar way. Instead, in early 2024, she applied for — and won — the Suncorp Resilient Communities category of the GradConnection AFR 2024 Top100 Future Leaders scheme, which brings together top students and graduate employers from across the country.
Arya Lohar was a 2024 Top100 Future Leaders award winner
She also signed up for the UTS Consulting Club, a student-run society that connects members to professional development and networking opportunities that will help them stand out in the job market.
At the time, she wanted to meet other students at UTS who shared her interests in business, and she also thought it might be a good way of stacking her resume with some valuable skills. After being selected to join the club, she took part in the pro-bono consulting program in which teams of students are selected to deliver consulting solutions for real-world clients.
“The client will give you a problem they want to solve or something they want to achieve, and you have to help them do it. You have to give them a strategy and solutions,” Arya says.
Shortly after joining the program, she was appointed leader of a student team tasked with helping a digital property company grow the user base for their custom app.
Their solution — a strategy to improve the user interface, send personalised push notifications based on user activity, and foster partnerships with mortgage brokers and real estate agents — did more than just impress the client. Arya and her team also won the Consulting Cup for being the most successful team.
Arya Lohar joined the UTS Consulting Club
With such a long list of accolades behind her, it’s easy to forget that in the early days Arya struggled to find her footing at university. Now, bolstered by all her extracurricular experiences, she’s well on her way towards a business career.
“There are so many jobs out there that a business degree prepares you for,” she says.
“Through my experiences at UTS, I’ve learnt that I like thinking analytically and I also like working with people. Consulting is a great combination of the two.”
The next step is a graduate employment program (she has already accepted an offer from Viva Energy) that she’ll undoubtedly wring every opportunity out of, just as she’s done at UTS.