Category: Internship

Yesterday marked the final day of my internship with the Lenawee Intermediate School District.  That morning when I woke up at 5am all I could think about was how excited I was that this was going to be my last day.  By the end of the day, that attitude had changed.

This internship had a lot of work to it.  Probably more than I was expecting.  They day of the Fine Arts Festival was amazing though.  All the kids seemed to really enjoy the day, and when they were finally done rehearsing and the evening performance started, I was amazed.  I couldn’t believe how well they were doing in all the different forms of art.  And I was so ready to join in! I wanted to be in one of the TRACKs learning all these great things.

Once the day came to a close and I was saying my goodbyes to everyone, I wanted to cry.  It was such a great day and everything went so well that I was glad I had put in all the hard work I had.  I didn’t want it to be my last day.  Hopefully I’ll be able to help out again next year.

Welcome to the real world Muffy!  This week I have been to the LISD everyday for my internship, and since school has ended today, I’m home.  My supervisor told me and the other intern to take a couple days off and enjoy being home.  She told us not to worry about the Fine Arts Festival…well, I’m still replying to emails and doing work.  It never ends.  I’m an hour and a half away from the LISD and it’s still as if I’m there.

I’m not complaining.  I’m really enjoying my internship and I can’t wait to see the event on May 11th, but it would be nice to get a break.  Oh well, it’s crunch time.  I’ll get a break on May 12th.

Today during my internship at the LISD, I joined members of the community on a “workshop on the move” to learned about the educational offers in Lenawee County.  The morning started out at the LISD Tech Center, where we learned about the Tech Center and JCC.  It was pretty interesting.

From there we went to the Montessori Children’s House/St. Joseph Academy located at Siena Heights University.  We learned about the programs that St. Joseph offer along with a degree program that is offered through a joint program with JCC and Siena Heights.

After we were done there, we heading to Adrian High School to learn out their recent IB program, which was interesting, but it sounded like a lot of work for high school students.  It’s supposed to prepare them extremely well for college though, so that good.

We ended at Adrian College (my home school) to learn about business and entrepreneurial opportunities and a way to help keep and bring jobs to Lenawee County.  It was interesting to hear seeing I haven’t taken any  classes in the business department so the information way all new to me.

So what does this have to do with PR?  Well, the community members that were involved in the workshop were Real Estate agents.  It’s important for the agents to know about these opportunities in the community, because they can showcase them when trying to sell a house to families in the area.  Parents are always concerned about education, and of course, they want to move to an area that will provide their children (or future children) with a great education.  Now that they know this information, they can give the public what it wants.

Being a student is a full time job in itself…try throwing an internship on top of that and spending three days a week there because there’s so much work to be done.  That’s my life right now, and it’s right at the end of the semester with finals coming up.  Welcome to the real world.

Right now, time management is the key to not going crazy!  Basically every moment of my day is scheduled.  Just a warning to any college student going to do an internship, make sure you have the time or can make the time.

So today for my internship with the LISD, we had a committee meeting!  The meeting went way faster than expected and we accomplished everything we needed to.  It was really good.  After the meeting, one of the committee members was talking with my supervisor and myself.  She asked if I was a senior and I was like, “no, I’m a junior.”  She replied with, “oh, so we’ll have you for next year too.”

I didn’t know what to say…I’d love to come back next year and help out again.  I’ve enjoyed my internship so much, and I think it’s fun.  Plus, if I were there a second year, I’d have an idea of what to do and what the festival was like.

I guess it’s nothing I need to consider now…I have plenty of time before I have to “reapply” for the position.  Plus, I know there are other people on this campus that would love the chance to have this internship, so I may want to let them take care of it.  We’ll see…maybe they just want to hire me? Haha.

I’m starting to learn that you’re never done in the world of PR.  Last week was my Spring Break where I thought I was finally going to get a break from Circle K, Alpha Phi, school work, and my internship.  I was wrong.  I was getting tons of emails each day, some included things for my internship.  It wasn’t a problem.  I had access to my email over break and could do some of the stuff, but not all.  That made today’s visit to the LISD busy.  Anything that we couldn’t get done over break we had to do this morning.  We got everything done, then realized, we’re probably going to have to go back later this week and do more.  The Fine Arts Festival is approaching fast and there is a lot to do before the event.  This means, we will have a lot of work to do.

Yes, every job is busy and there is always going to be something that needs to get done, but I’ve especially noticed it with PR.  I’m always busy with Circle K and Alpha Phi, but I feel like I can get that stuff done and have a mini-break before the next thing comes in…with my internship that doesn’t happen.

It’s good that I have this experience now.  It’s showing me what I might have to do once I get a job in PR and I have a much better idea of what to expect.  Lets just hope I can make it through the semester now.

I’ll be honest, there are a lot of things PR professionals need to do that are not in the job description.  Last month, one of my professors and my former supervisor from my internship, had to cover chocolate bars with a label about our school’s website going mobile.  One of my friends who works as a student worker in the PR Office on campus had to make buttons to celebrate our mascot’s birthday.  Today, I had to make a parental consent form to send out to schools for the Fine Arts Festival.

It’s not quite the same as the other two activities listed, but not what I was expecting.  When I think of a PR profession, I think of doing things like press releases, social media, crisis control, websites, photography, and publicity.  Although as I’ve been told by multiple people…this field isn’t always what it seems.  I’ve been told that going into PR sometimes you’ll do thing for a company you never thought you’d do.

So today marked the last day of my internship.  It’s been quite a busy semester, but I’m really glad I got to have this opportunity and learn so much.  It’s one thing to take the PR class, but it’s another to actually observe the PR field.  Throughout this semester I learned about Abode InDesign and Dreamweaver, I updated the student activities blogs, I learned about surveys, and so much more.  The good news is, I’ll still be getting some more PR experience in next semester.  My internship with the PR Office on campus may be over, but I will be working with the Lenawee Intermediate School District next semester as a PR/Communications Intern.  And, I will keep this blog running…be prepared to hear all about my experiences as a PR Intern.

Today marked the first day of my internship in the Public Relations Office at Adrian College.  The day started out with Janet working on the Adrian College website.  She showed me how the webpages are designed, how she creates links, adds facebook links, and designs graphics.  We added a link to the homepage, along with putting a facebook page thread on other.  I never knew there was so much detail put into these links on the Adrian College webpage.

We also ran into a copyright issue.  A twitter user has the Adrian College logo on his page with an event listed making it seem like the college is sponsoring the event, which they’re not.  This was an issue that Janet had to take care of, so I saw how she had to deal with that.  She told me that random situations like that happen sometimes, so when I come in throughout the semester interesting things like this may occur.