March 28, 2024

For students needing an outlet in the realm of freelance employment, there is a new service that they can use closer to home and their potential clientele. 

The new Conestoga Gigs website, spearheaded by the Conestoga Entrepreneurship Collective, is meant to be the first official support tool for those in the Conestoga community attempting to find ‘gigs’ and other types of for-hire employment in Waterloo Region. 

Companies or individuals who wish to find a potential freelancer simply search the database by the skill they are looking for, such as graphic design, branding or consulting and are met with a list of student-based collectives or individuals, with a corresponding list of their skills. 

A screenshot of the conestogagigs.ca website, where a handful of freelancers are featured under the search bar.

Andrew Heubner, a professor who teaches a course in Media Freelancing & Entrepreneurship at Conestoga, gave his impressions on the website in an email correspondence.

“It’s very efficient and would be a time-saver for businesses … freelancing is a huge part of the way work will be done in the future…so it’s perfect timing for Conestoga to create a centralized location where businesses and freelancers can meet.”

To become a freelancer on Conestoga Gigs, there are some minimum requirements:


  • You have to be in a full-time or part -ime program at Conestoga College
  • A recent graduate
  • Alumni of five years or less

There is an application form to be completed for entry into a cohort for Winter 2022 and Spring 2022. The applications are currently closed for the fall cohort, so prospective freelancers will have to keep a close eye on the upcoming application dates on the Gig Lab information portal.

“If I had to use this instead of, let’s just say, Fiverr, I probably would have taken it up a long time ago,” said Henry Davison, a student at the University of Toronto, “I’m surprised that we don’t have something like that here.”

Every freelancer receives a “Gig Coach” who provides “structure, support and guidance” for each of the 15 weeks that a cohort runs. The website, its services and the oversight provided come free of charge to the freelancer (unlike other services like FlexJobs, which collect a subscription for a person to offer their services.)

For any additional questions about the project, email the Conestoga Entrepreneurship Collective.

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