Faith Runnells is using her newfound passions to better increase her life skills and work experience. Directly following her graduation in June of 2016, Runnells attended the University of Virginia (UVA), where she plans on graduating from in May of 2020.

“As a college student, my top responsibility right now is to learn a lot at my university. Going to college is my full-time job currently so I take that very seriously. I’m really focused on the different classes I can take,” Runnells said. “UVA is really nice because you have so many opportunities for classes to take that aren’t necessarily your major. I’m in classes like anthropology and philosophy and psychology and I’m getting this diverse array of knowledge.”

Runnells currently takes many opportunities at UVA, trying to expand her learning and resources. One of these opportunities that Runnells has taken hold of is being a tour guide at UVA, allowing her to learn new things everyday.

“I think one of the things I’ve learned from the most [at UVA], which is an opportunity that UVA gave me, was being a tour guide. We give people normal tours and admission tours, and I have learned so much from the people who come in every single day,” Runnells said. “Three days ago I gave a tour, and one of the women from the first class of women to go to UVA was on my tour. There I was on my historical women stop [on the tour] talking about the first class of women, and after I stop she goes, ‘I was one of those women.’ It’s been really cool to meet all the people who come on my tours.”

Runnells is on track to major in finance, and has recently received a ten-week internship with Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York City. Even while using her college experience in her internship and her future career, Runnells is also planning on using her knowledge and teachings from Newsstreak in her future.

“I worked in Newsstreak when I was in high school and I was actually the print-editor-in-chief in my senior year. I think that even [with] Newsstreak as a high schooler I learned so much because when you’re a freshman and have to interview a senior or adult, sometimes that can be scary. I think that right off the bat Newsstreak was teaching me how to get out of my comfort zone and really go for whatever I wanted,” Runnells said. “When I was on the editorial board, eventually [becoming] an editor-in-chief, I was the one who really would come up with new and innovative stories and pushing the paper to be the best it could be. That was always fun and I always liked working in teams in Newsstreak and that’s actually why I eventually decided to go into business, because I learned how much I love working in a team.”

Runnells will be thrown directly into the workforce as an intern, starting out as an investment breaker, with odds showing that she will be the youngest on her team. Runnells plans to use what she learned as a tour guide in her internship to better improve her work effort.

“The tour guide aspect has taught me how to present myself and material, and most of the stuff I talk about is touchy, because it represents history and UVA’s history. It’s really taught me how to approach situations and it’s taught me how to answer questions on my feet. Also, just the amount of people and resources and knowledge at UVA has taught me how to take advantage of things that are right in front of you, and it taught me how important it is to take every opportunity and use it to the most potential that you can,” Runnells said. “Really anything can turn into something crazy. [For example], me sending an application for an emerging women’s program that would last twenty-four hours has led me to go to New York and work this summer for ten weeks, working on Wall Street with some of the most intelligent people in the world.”