Elizabeth Mitchell: taking life and career to the West Coast

Elizabeth Mitchell

Bates College, art and visual culture major, May 2009

Current hometown: Seattle, Wash.

Age: 26

Live at home/rent/buy your own home? Rent

Current job? Very currently, as in, for two more weeks, I am coaching sailing at Sail Sand Point on Lake Washington. I had been working in the creative department at L.L.Bean for over two years (prior to that at The VIA Agency in Portland, Maine) building my career as budding art director. This past January, I sold everything that didn’t fit into my wagon and moved west to support my boyfriend in his new career in Seattle. I’m having an amazing time exploring the Pacific northwest, (rafting in Idaho and hiking in the Olympic and Cascade mountain ranges . . . the scale of the wildness here is just awesome), connecting with a new community and exploring what comes next in my young career.

Enjoy what you do? Love what I do.

If you’re comfortable sharing, how much college debt are you still carrying? So very thankfully none.

So, the big question: Was it worth it? Absolutely.

Is your job now related to your major? Yes.

Please finish this sentence: “When it came to college, my parents were right about . . .” Encouraging me to be an art major, even though at the age of 18 I’m sure none of us knew how I was ever going to make money someday.

And: “My parents were wrong about . . .” My parents are never wrong. Right, Mom?

What are you hoping for as you look out over the next 10 years, personally and professionally? I am hoping to continue to find balance between my personal life and professional life. To keep exploring and testing my career options: art director, educator, communicator. I look forward to continuing to travel around our vast county and beyond its borders. I see myself coming home, to Maine again. (Don’t worry, Mom and Dad!) And I look forward to being a mother someday. (I said someday! The question said next 10 years, so don’t worry Mom and Dad and Chris!)

Do you feel your college experience plays any role in those goals? Sure. I remember thinking for the year after I graduated that college hadn’t prepared me for the real world as I transitioned from studio art classes, academic discussions, intramural sports games and all-you-can-eat vegan dining options, to sitting eight hours a day behind a computer waiting for TGIF, where the highlight might be someone bringing untoasted bagels to the work room because I haven’t gotten groceries for days because I’m too busy writing cover letters and babysitting because my internship was paying, well, a lot less than babysitting.

Now, four years later, I realize that college wasn’t about preparing me for the nitty-gritty of life — that’s what these twentysomething years are about. College should be about exploration and optimism. College should ignite your fire and steer you to discover passions and interests that will shape the rest of your life.

For me, college was a solid and invigorating foundation for everything that comes next: life.

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Since the Sun Journal stopped following the original 15 students in our “Following the Freshmen” series in 2009, bringing to a close our four-year college project, they’ve established interesting lives, careers and pursuits. And gained a lot of perspective on the value of their educations. We were able to catch up with 11 former freshmen and quiz them about life, college and future goals, and how school played into all of it.