Following a trip that was at odds with any reasonable compliance with logistics, NMU senior and electronic journalism major Barry Winslow took a three and a half hour nap on Wednesday, March 20.

Winslow had just returned from three days of traveling to and from Detroit — an eight hour trip in good weather — for Gov. Snyder’s first ever Economic Summit at the Cobo Center in downtown Detroit.

Winslow had, just two weeks earlier, been chosen as one of only 21 college students statewide that would attend the summit, which discussed Michigan’s economic circumstances and the disparities between available jobs in the state and the talent and education that is being provided in colleges.

“I was one of 10 students out of the 21 that spoke at the general session,” Winslow said. “The general session was when the governor came in and made some opening remarks, talking about how we are trying to pump jobs into the Michigan economy. He said what we need to do is find a way that we can connect the employers of Michigan’s workforce with [college and educated students].”

Winslow was presented with the opportunity to speak when his roommate and NMU graduate Derek Bush received an email about it through the business where he is currently employed.

“We received information about the Young Talents panel that would happen at the beginning of the Governors Summit,” said Bush, a business development representative at the Lake Superior Community Partnership in Marquette. “I’ve also known Barry for many years and I know he is a very hard working individual. The timing was perfect — he’ll be graduating in May and he is very charismatic, so I knew he would be very good in front of a group of people and in front of a panel.”

According to Winslow, the summit lasted two days — Monday, March 18 and Tuesday, March 19. Events began on Sunday night for him and the other students; however, as they were assigned mentors, put in networking workshops and given the opportunity to look over, adjust  and discuss their resumes with experts.

“I got down there on Sunday and we had like a six-hour training session,” Winslow said. “We had mentors that were helping us with our speeches, they taught us how to network with individuals, what to say and how to approach people.”

Following the training session on Sunday, Winslow and the others were sent to the summit with their speeches and a stack of resumes on hand.

“It was incredible,” he said. “We were basically brainstorming and meeting with a whole bunch of CEOs and executives of major corporations and businesses throughout the entire state of Michigan. I actually wound up with about 40 business cards.”

According to Winslow, he was one of only two student representing Upper Peninsula schools, as there was one student present from Michigan Tech.

He was also one of only three communication majors at the summit, being that he is an electronic journalism major and an English minor.  After graduating in May, he plans to pursue communication, and said the contacts made at the summit could be helpful.

“I definitely want to do something with communications and writing but I know that I have a passion for music and I want to see if I can get involved in that,” he said. “But it’d be nice if I can get plugged in to do external or internal communications for a company in Michigan to help them out.”