“I would rather not spend another couple years in school. I want to be able to just enjoy life.”

Mihail Yankov, 22, is in his last semester at UW-Madison. After the pandemic caused some complications with his school and career path, he found himself reflecting on what is important. With graduation a couple months away and a job secured, he is eager to take on the next chapter.

Grant Sanger: What is your current employment status?

Mihail Yankov: I’m just working part-time for a food delivery service, just as a driver. I work maybe once or twice a week. Then, I’ll start a full-time job in Madison in January, after I graduate.

Have you had any other jobs over the past year, or two?

Yeah. Last summer I worked as a mechanical engineering intern at this company called Infinity in Green Bay. They make these big machines for packaging paper products, like paper towels and things like that. So, I worked there from May to August. Then stopped once school started.

When you were working there, what was it like? Did you face any challenges or difficulties with the pandemic?

As far as challenges with the pandemic, I was initially supposed to do it in the summer of 2020. It ended up getting cancelled and then it got pushed back a year, to last summer.

Otherwise, when I worked there in the summer, it wasn’t too bad. Mostly in my role, I worked with my engineering team. But I think before (the pandemic), they would also try to get out and do some more meetings with clients and visit different locations that they would be sending these machines to. I think they had to cut back on that. So, I didn’t really get as much exposure working with customer as I probably would have if I worked there in a non-pandemic summer.

You said you were currently working part-time doing food delivery. What has that been like?

Two summers ago, when that internship I was going to have got cancelled and pushed back, it was kind of late notice, and everything was closed. There were minimal jobs available, so this was one of the only things I could do.  I started doing that. I was doing that full-time over the summer.

It was definitely strange, walking into the restaurants and they are all empty. Usually, they were oriented so that they would have a table by the front of the door. You would come in and grab it off the table, with no interactions with any of the staff. Also, when I was dropping it off, the instructions were to leave it (the food) outside the door. Where I’m pretty sure before the pandemic they would want you to meet the person and give it to them face-to-face. That was pretty weird.

What are your future goals? Have they changed at all in the past two years dealing with the pandemic?

As of right now, it’s kind of hard to say too far forward. Just because it’s going to be my first full-time job. I feel like once I start working there, and I have some experience under my belt, I will be able to know more of what I’m into and what I like doing. As of right now, I’m thinking I’ll work for a little bit, then maybe try and move into a management position, eventually.

Before I was thinking of going to grad school after I finish my undergrad. But, with the pandemic keeping everything locked down, I’m not really doing too much. I would rather not spend another couple years in school. I want to be able to just enjoy life and spend some more time doing what I want to do. Rather than doing more school.

Has your view on working changed with everything that has gone on the past few years?

Yeah, I think so. Even being able to meet up with a group of friends and hang out for a little bit, or maybe go out to dinner. Once that got unexpectedly taken away from us, seemingly overnight. It made me have a new appreciation for that kind of stuff.

 Once things opened back up, I wanted to go see all my friends. I never wanted to chill at home. I definitely have a lot more appreciation for my free time.

If you could go back in time to the start of the pandemic and tell yourself anything, what would it be?

I guess I would say to be more responsible or patient. I remember the first night when things were closing down, I was getting mad. All the sudden, I couldn’t see my friends. I was saying that the whole thing was blown out of proportion. Then once you look at the severity of what was going on and how bad things had gotten, I wish earlier in the pandemic I would’ve took things more seriously. Maybe if me and a lot of other people would’ve done that, it wouldn’t have gotten as bad as it did.