Courtney Mains finishing her sophomore year at the University of Oregon. She studies Journalism and Public Relations in the School of Journalism and Communication. She is a sports fanatic, but also an extremely passionate student and hopes to combine her two areas of study for a career in the future.

What was your dream job when you were younger?
When I was younger, I wanted to be a teacher cause my mom was a teacher, my grandma was, and my grandpa was, so I was always around that and I always liked my teachers in elementary school.

How has that dream changed?
I definitely don’t want to be a teacher anymore. My dream job now is completely different. I want to do PR for the San Francisco Giant’s. I think that it’s changed with how I’ve changed as a person, and I don’t think I could ever be a teacher, but I’ve been passionate about sports my whole life.  When I came to Oregon I became really passionate about the J School and getting an organization’s message across. I would love to work for the Giant’s because they have a lot of great outreach programs that people should know about because it’s more than just baseball.

How do you plan on pursuing that goal?
I’ve been getting really involved here. Right now I work at The Emerald as the marketing director and I plan a lot of events. I love doing community outreach and involving the community by getting sponsorships and things like that. Next year I’m going to be working for the athletic department, which is my next step. I’m going to be a communications intern for Oregon Athletics, so that’s a big step, and I just found that out last week. I’ll just keep going on that path, hopefully making those connections with people.

What obstacles could you see getting in the way?
Getting into sports is really competitive as it is and it kind of sucks at times. It’s great, but you have to know people. I just have to be making connections with the right people and surrounding myself with people who care about me and want me to succeed. Also, just being a woman trying to get into sports. When I interviewed for the Oregon Athletics intern position, it was a room of seven powerful men, which is awesome to me…I wasn’t intimidated, but it’s something I hope to change. It’s different being a girl in that field.

What does communication mean to you?
It means telling somebody else’s story…getting their message across. It could be as simple as a person’s story or an organization’s story, and also forming relationships with people.

By: Sophie Wenet