How joining JDCC gave me more than another line on my resume.
Being told to get involved in university is pretty predictable advice. But beyond adding another line to your resume, have you ever thought about what getting involved actually gives you?
I didn’t.
However, I learned very quickly that it is much more than that.
Getting involved can completely change what university feels like. It gives you a community within a much bigger school. For me, one of the biggest examples of that has been my experience with JDCC at Schulich.
University Feels Different When You Find Your People
One of the biggest things I gained from getting involved was something that has nothing to do with a resume: friendships.
At university, it is surprisingly easy to go to class, give a polite smile to the person sitting next to you, barely speak a word to them for the entire semester, and never see them again once the class ends. Clubs create a completely different environment.
You spend time together outside of class, work toward something you all care about, celebrate the wins, support each other throughout the losses and figure things out along the way.
Some of the moments I remember most from the past 3 years aren’t the lectures- they’re the inside jokes, the late nights, the projects, and the new people that have become huge parts of my life.
Getting involved turned school from somewhere I attended into somewhere I actually felt part of.
Then Came JDCC
JDCC became one of the experiences that shaped my university life the most. JDCC is a club that competes at the largest national business case competition (Jeux Du Commerce Central) each year.
It consists of four teams: Academics, Debate, Sports, and Social.
It introduced me to an entirely different side of school. One especially filled with school spirit and competition.
You can read about teamwork and communication in a textbook, but it is another thing entirely when you are sitting in a room with a group of people all working toward one common goal: winning.
Getting Comfortable With Being Uncomfortable
One of the most important things JDCC taught me was that confidence usually comes after you do something uncomfortable, not before.
I learned this during my time on the 2025 Social team when first joining JDCC.
Think of it as acting and improv. “But Christina, I thought you said JDCC was a professional business case competition?” Well yeah… cue the uncomfortable part!
The Social teams from each school were competing all weekend, in costume, in character, and… sometimes in front of the whole competition. So while our finance team was religiously crunching numbers and our debate team was rebutting like no tomorrow, my team was in… wigs? But there is no better way to gain critical thinking, communication, and teamwork skills than being in the thick of it running on 3 hours of sleep.
But hey, act we did! As silly as it sounds, we put our hearts and souls into every performance we did and brought home first place! I even won Socialite of the Year!
Sometimes You Just Have to Say Yes
I think one of the easiest things to do in university is convince yourself that you will get involved later. When the opportunity to become JDCC Co-Captain for the 2026 year came along, I was initially hesitant.
“I’ll do it next year.”
“I’m too busy.”
“I’ve never done anything like that before.”
There will always be a reason not to.
But it was an experience that shaped my university life because I said yes before knowing exactly what I was getting myself into. You do not need to feel completely prepared before joining a club, applying for a position, attending an event, or trying something new.
Sometimes the point is that you are not ready yet.
That is where a lot of the growth happens.
My advice is not to join everything. Find one or two things you genuinely care about and actually give yourself the chance to become part of them. Because saying yes once can open the door to opportunities you did not even know existed when you first joined.
Becoming Co-Captain Changed the Experience Again
I took the risk, said yes, and became 2026 JDCC Schulich Co-Captain along with my great friend Priya!
That introduced an entirely different kind of learning.
Being responsible for a group of people teaches you very quickly that leadership is not just about being the person who makes decisions. You are working with people who have different personalities, schedules, priorities, communication styles, and opinions. Yet somehow everyone still has to move in the same direction.
I learned how important it is to communicate clearly, delegate responsibilities, keep people motivated, solve problems, adjust plans, give feedback, manage disagreements, recognize when someone else has a better idea- Wait this list is still going?
Sometimes leadership means stepping forward. Other times, it means stepping back and letting someone else take ownership. And a lot of the time, it means trying to find a meeting time that works for a group of university students…which might be the hardest management challenge of all.
Navigating those different personalities and responsibilities gave me experience that would have been almost impossible to recreate in a classroom.
It also taught me that managing people is not about getting everyone to think the same way. Some of our strongest ideas came from disagreement and people bringing completely different perspectives to the table!
And Then Comes the Payoff
One of the best parts of putting that much time into something is eventually getting to see the work pay off.
For me, one of those moments was winning.
Schulich won 3rd place School of the Year- an award that had been untouched by us for a very long time.
The win itself was exciting, but what made it meaningful was knowing everything that came before it: the meetings, preparation, conversations, disagreements, teamwork, and a lot of chaos along the way.
Rather than just explaining that moment, I think this one is better shown.
Looking back, the video represents much more to me than a win.
It represents the people I met, the friendships I built, the responsibility I took on, and everything I learned from working with a group toward something we genuinely cared about.
That is ultimately why I think students should get involved.
You can go to university, complete your classes, and go home every day. You will still graduate. But you may miss the experiences happening around all of that. JDCC gave me skills I know I will carry into my career, but it also gave me friendships and memories I will carry with me forever.
Classes give you a reason to come to campus.
The people and experiences you find outside of them can give you a reason to actually feel part of it.
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