Twenty-three years ago, after arriving in Kingston from England, Jyoti Kotecha visited the Queen’s University International Centre (QUIC). She had moved to Canada with her husband and needed support to help find her place in her new community.

“I breathed a sigh of relief when I stepped through the centre’s doors,” says Ms. Kotecha, who is of Indian heritage but was born in Mombasa, Kenya, and moved to London when she was five years old. “It was a huge shock to move to Kingston from London. There were very few South Asian families here at the time and I desperately wanted to connect with people who shared my background.”

Ms. Kotecha says it was Susan Anderson who greeted her and helped her connect with families in the community. (Ms. Anderson was most recently interim director of QUIC, and prior to that, assistant director.) She also says she loved the informal setting of QUIC, with students of different backgrounds gathered and chatting in the lounge, as they still do now. She felt accepted.

Now, in many ways, Ms. Kotecha has come full circle – in January, she became director of QUIC after many years in Queen’s Department of Family Medicine.

“It is wonderful to be in this position. This centre is very important for Queen’s, for its international students and also its domestic students,” Ms. Kotecha says. “Students who come through QUIC’s doors are able to find the resources they need and are looking for in order to thrive on campus and in Kingston.

“I found those resources many years ago, and of course, what’s offered has only grown over the years.  In particular, QUIC now also offers intercultural education workshops and certificate programs that help students, staff and faulty become more sensitive to cultural diversity.”

Before coming to Kingston, Ms. Kotecha was an analytical chemist, holding a science honours degree from the University of Greenwich. Her husband wanted to find international teaching opportunities and it was his job at a local school that brought them to Canada. Soon after they arrived, they had a son and Ms. Kotecha stayed home for several years before pursuing work at Queen’s, first as a research associate in biochemistry. She later moved to family medicine, and since 2007, she held the position of assistant director in the Centre for Studies in Primary Care.

Back in the mid-’90s, as she and her family integrated into life here, they became increasingly involved with community support groups in Kingston, and began helping out newcomers to the city.

“The relationships I’ve forged in Kingston are very strong and very beneficial to the work I am now doing at QUIC,” says Ms. Kotecha, who also holds a Master of Public Administration from Queen’s School Policy Studies. “QUIC really bridges both worlds – the campus and the broader community – and the more links we can give students the better off they will be as they navigate a new city and country.”

Ms. Kotecha obviously already knows how invaluable QUIC is on campus, and she wants to continue the work of past directors in getting the word out to more students. With experienced and long-standing staff members, the centre offers countless resources, including help with visas and citizenship, orientation services, English language support, housing support, study and living abroad advising/help, as well as the International Educators Training Program, among numerous other services.

As she transitions to her new role, Ms. Kotecha has her eye on broadening the centre’s wellness programs, in line with the university’s efforts to offer more mental health services and supports to students.

“Domestic students face challenges while at university, and for international students, those challenges are amplified, being so far from home and adapting to a new culture,” she says. “We want to get international students thinking about quality of life early on – nutrition and exercise, for example – and help them manage any stresses they encounter.”

For more information on QUIC and its services, visit the website or drop by the centre in the John Deutsch University Centre (JDUC).