Blog #13 The End: Graduation & Job Search Cont'd

As we may have all been aware, the end of the semester is soon approaching and graduation is very near. I've put the job searching on hold in effort to focus on my upcoming final exams, papers, assignments etc. I recently paid a visit to my former internship supervisor, and some other co-workers. I initially went to collect my evaluation forms but she insisted that I should have her and the others take me to lunch. So, myself, her, the supervisor, and another co-worker went to eat at a restaurant called SnS. We sat and spoke about a variety of things- current events, incidents at the school, graduation, and how my job search was coming along. Afterward, we drove back to the school and my supervisor had a one-on-one discussion regarding my evaluation. I liked the idea that we were able to sit and discuss my strong and weak areas. We've had the same discussion a few times but it was a good opportunity to meet up again.

On another note, I recently had an interview at a high school in Boston, for an Athletic Director position. I wasn't too happy to be honest. The interviewer interviewed me for like literally 3 minutes. And I can distinctly remember the three questions that were asked: 1) What is your experience working with kids? 2) Why do you think high school athletics is important? And 3) What do you consider some areas for growth/ development?. I guess I was mainly disappointed in the fact that I had put in so much work into getting ready for this opportunity: transportation costs, my expensive get-up/suit, and even the fact the I dedicated half of a day to practice for the interview. I studied for this interview like I was studying for a major exam- I went over the description over and over again and pretty much read through the organization's website. But oh well...I've come to the realization that I can look at this experience as an opportunity for growth, and it prepares me for other interviews for careers in the future.

Bittersweet

Saying goodbye at my office was hard and sad. I really enjoyed my time there and everyone i've worked with so it was sad to leave but I'm happy this semester is so close to and end. For my last week my supervisor kept it calm with not starting me on any new projects. So on my first day this week I mailed out the prizes that were won from the place-a-thon about two weeks ago now. It was an annoying task because the things that needed to me shipped were an odd size and shape but this project helped me to ask others for help and realizing that there are some things I'm not going to be able to figure out on my own without help. The next day I helped write up a few camper profiles for an email and did an online research project. It was calm but the internship as a whole showed me a lot. It most importantly showed me a great work environment and helped me realize what kind of work environment I am going to do my best in, in the future.

Finale

So last week was my last 'official' week on the internship site. I pretty much just finished up tidbits that I haven't gotten around to finishing. A lot of work on just database entry and looking up more artist for our venue as we will be taking the current artist down. The only important things were mentioning of finishing up the hours of my log sheet as well as the evaluations. He told me to just tell him the day before to remind him to do them. I trust him to get it done though. He definitely procrastinates on certain projects. I also offered to stay for a day a week during the summer. We also had another student from Lesley come in for an interview. She is a writing major and Dan needs someone with professional writing skills to write on their blog. We talked a bit about the interview. I am really feeling a close bond with him. I think we would make a great team in his business. I can't wait to see the possibilities going forward!

It was a wonderful class to be in. My last internship seminar wasn't so exciting. It was more of just a busy work type of class and this one had some insightful psychological effects. It was enlightening.

I recently just got a job a restaurant in Downtown Lowell for a bit as to be able to make some income to be more flexible when I decide to start searching for my career. Wherever that may be. I am excited to be graduating and going forward! I have so much I want to do with my life and I can't wait to start it! It's going to be amazing and can't wait for graduation day! Good luck to Everybody! Chase your dreams!

wrapping up

United Nations Association of Greater Boston's biggest event of the year, the annual Consuls Ball (a gala to support America's youth) has now come and gone. As I spent all day friday working on the final pieces of the event I realized how lucky I was to have such a positive atmosphere and environment to work at. As much as working long hours and doing a lot of tasks seemed awful at the time, I really learned a lot through working with a non-profit organization. As I also attended the event and as the event seemed to speed by I realized how much work we put into an 8 hour event, I never knew how much work was needed in order to create a successful event and I appreciated the learning process of this as well. As an aspiring event planner I'm very fortunate to understand the ins and outs of creating an event as well as seeing how managing of a team works. My supervisor did a very good job in having roles for each person at the event and I now fully understand how to create an event from the beginning to end. I now know I do not want to pursue non-profit event planning, but I am excited to take my learnings onto my next steps of pursing an event planning career.


Thanks for reading!

Final Week

Yesterday was my final day at my internship. It was really interesting. It started off terribly. Something happened with my phone and I woke up late for the first time all semester. I panicked because it was my last day but I was able to talk to my supervisor and she said not to worry and to get there when I could. I got there late but didn’t seem to miss anything so I felt better. I did some tasks for a few people around the office then was asked by the president to sit in on a brainstorm for an upcoming campaign for Bermuda. Although I didn’t know a lot about the campaign so far, it was really great to hear the ideas and learn their rationale for making decisions. After that, the president asked if I wanted to sit in on her presentation that she was preparing for Monday. I sat in with most of the other people in the company and we listened to her present our campaign so far for Bermuda.  It was a really moving presentation. I really loved everything that we have prepared so far, and so heartfelt she was in presenting it. After that I was asked to research what travel books and other sources say about Bermuda, just to get a better idea of how to describe it. I also was asked to research inventive social campaigns, for example, “the best job in the world” campaign. Knowing of some other ideas like that could help us stir up our own inventive ideas. 

Another part of my day was talking to my supervisor about the upcoming position. They are still interviewing candidates, so they have not made a decision about who they are hiring yet. My supervisor was very optimistic about me being a part of the team and was asking me when I would be able to start and other information like that, so I feel that I do have a strong chance of working there this summer. This is really exciting to me. I love the company and the culture and I hope that I can work there and eventually be a part of the team.

Wrap up!

As the final weeks approach at my internship, I have a lot of time to reflect what happened this semester. I certainly had a wonderful experience filled with learning that I will take with me to my first job.
This past week was particularly exciting; I was the subject of a photo shoot! I had never done a photo shoot before, but it was really fun. A while ago, the Internship Office at Lesley contacted me because they wanted to take professional pictures of me at the Citi Performing Arts Center. This seemed like a really great opportunity that I wanted to take and put on my resume. Considering it was my first photo shoot, I think I did well. The photographer seemed to like all of the pictures. I mean, many of them were being taken in the Wang Theater, which is a really beautiful place.
In addition to the photos that were taken, an interview was conducted. I knew that they were going to tape me for something but I was not sure exactly what was going to happen. It ended up being an interview and I was asked various questions about my internship experience and Lesley. This was difficult to do because I had not prepared any responses and had to give quick concise answers on the fly. However, even despite waking up with a cold, I still managed to do well. The woman who conducted the interview said I was a natural (I never thought I would be a natural at something like that). Overall, it was a really good experience and I was glad to partake in it.
Next week will be my final day at the Citi Performing Arts Center.

Internship

My internship has been going really well this week and last, despite a few ups and downs. I had an issue getting an interview for an article because there was a shift in management, the person who was able to answer my questions was leaving the city. It was difficult to get in contact with the companies, and I had to delay the article. I was given another article to draft. There is an upcoming protest about Martha Coakley and medical marijuana. I interviewed the person in charge of the protest. At first I was a bit nervous about the interview, but I tried to put together the questions and research beforehand. The interview went really well. It was very conversational, but I was glad I had drafted my questions beforehand. My supervisor had taught me to add a little "kicker" to the interview. He laughed before the question.
I learned from this experience that I enjoy interviewing. I like talking to different types of people and hearing what they are passionate about. It is an eye-opening experience that I hope is incorporated with the line of work I am going into.

Eleventh Week

This week has been probably the best week at the TR.  I just received an email from my cite supervisor that the Outdoor Bootcamp's first day (May 2nd) is completely full!!! They told me that this reflected my work as far as advertising and guerrilla marketing goes.  I spent several hours passing out flyers and getting in touch with Somerville residents that could be interested in getting in shape and being held accountable by a workout program at 6:00AM every morning... it's a little harder than it sounds.

Now I'm working on emails to people that signed up for only one session instead of the whole 30 day pack that can be purchased. Exciting stuff. I hope to maybe get a job here during the summer as either an instructor or something long those lines to makes some money and keep learning about how to run a small business.

Thanks.

Last Week! (But not really :)

So this week was a lot more interesting. I came in and finally finished the database of entries and felt very good about finally finishing it. I then met our new Operations Coordinator Chris (who we met at one of our clients actually). I found out through Chris that he was hired based on his being a manager at and having people managing experience. I was feeling some resentment as I felt like the right hand man to Dan. I learned that he had some other skills and that he was also able to help out Dan much more with on site and customer relations calling.
I actually had decided to become more involved and step up when Dan needs help so I told him whatever he needs done he can get from me. Wednesday was actually the first day I had to do 'intern' work. I had to sort folders and files because Dan needed help sorting his information as it is everywhere which matches his personality type. He also gave me an assignment to help a client find an appropriate artist for his next show. He wanted a street art canvas style art between $50 to $200. I suggest several to Dan and some he already had but we worked out one which was great.

*That night I notified dan via e-mail about the hours log and all the evaluation sheets. I also extended out to him that I would be able to help out over the summer and would love to continuing working with him.

Thursday was another day. Dan invited me to an event at Bentley University in May to hear a conference about small business. It seems like it will be fun and is in late May which meant I would be staying on somewhat longer. We also tested some new features on the website. I also had made a features list that we need for our new online store. I picked a little over 30 pieces to display on our site and linked the in a sheet to dan for him to look at. It was a productive week.

Week 11

As I head into my final weeks of the internships my supervisor and I are beginning to wrap things up. For starters we polished up some of the most recent videos we have been working on. The major one we finished up was one that promotes the Pack Training they offer at the studio. It is the same as a one on one sessions but is half the cost because it it done in a group. It is pretty exciting to see our content all compiled together as it grows every week. I enjoy making these videos and will try to do as much as I can before I am done.

Also with the help of my supervisor I am on my way to securing a pretty cool internship for the Fall. They are located in the North End and specialize in training athletes which is what I had hoped to do in my next internships. Because of all my hard work over the semester my supervisor was more than happy to give me a recommendation. It goes to show that the connections you make are very important because even if what you are doing is not exactly what you want they will help you get to where you want to be.

Another Week

          This week, I am helping wrap up the school year bu finishing tastes for the athletic banquets, final games, etc.  I am still working on the Student Athlete Manual on my down time for Simmons.  Softball is coming to an end for me as well, and this has made it hard for me to come into internship as often.  I could have completed my final hours for internship this week, however because of make up games it will put me off till next Tuesday.
          I have spent almost a full year here in the Simmons Athletic Department.  It has really helped me to see what I want to do after college, and if I could see myself working in a college athletic department.  It will be crazy to be done and look back on everything that I learned and created while completing my internship at Simmons College.

Exciting opportunities

This Friday was a very exciting day at my internship. First, it was my first time making the trip to the new office in Winchester. This was kind of a pain because in involved me taking a bus, a train, and the commuter rail. Getting the office wasn’t too bad though and once I got there, the area and office were so nice that I didn’t mind the trip. It was nice to see the new set up and meet some of the new people that are part of the team. Our company, Fuseideas, bought a company called OTW and now we are one company, so everything is different than before. My work throughout the day wasn’t very exciting; I answered the phone and did some smaller tasks but nothing really substantial.

It was towards the end of the day where things got exciting. My supervisor came to me and told me about a position that they have for post-grad students in the summer. It is a paid summer internship for 3 months that could turn into a full time job. She told me that I was her best intern and how they’ve trusted me and loved having me and that I was the only intern she would offer this to! The compliments were really amazing and the job sounded ideal so I told her I was definitely interested. She then went to the President of the company, Cindy (former OTW) and told her about me and my interest in the position. Cindy then came over to me to formally introduce herself and asked me if I had a few minutes to talk. She had me send her my resume and meet her at her desk. I was absolutely terrified! I went and talked to her about my past experience and interest for the future and because it was so on-the-spot I have no idea how well or poorly I did. I did tell her that I have loved working for the company and that I am definitely interested in the position. She explained to me that it was a full-time (5 day a week, 8 hour per day) position for the summer. I would start as soon as possible and the goal would be for me to work as hard as possible and “convince them that they can’t live without me” by the end of my time as an intern. She also said that I would know right away whether or not this was for me. As terrifying as it is to get started with a “real-world” job right after school, I feel that it is an amazing opportunity that I would have to take. They are interviewing other people so it is not assured that I could get the job, but I did express interest. Hopefully I will know by next Friday!

Blog #12 Job Hunting

Ever since my internship ended, I've been spending a great deal of my time self-reflecting on my experiences at CRLS. Even more so, I've been spending the majority of my days online searching for jobs in the business management field. Since my major is so broad, I'm having a challenging time narrowing my choices and trying to figure out which area of business I would like to get into. I've had jobs as well as internships in the past that were in sports/athletic- related. However, I would like to explore other options; perhaps human resources, marketing or some non-profit organization. I've applied to 15- 20 companies so far in the Cambridge/Boston area, requesting various positions ranging from administrative assistant, associate, entry-level sales and marketing positions, and the list goes on. Through all this, I've learned something during the job search process- SCAMS. I have to be very careful about giving out personal information.

That is, my social security number, and information pertaining to references. I was surprised to learn that there are so many online job scams. For example, offers like: $5500/ monthly salary with no experience or college degree required; or “ take advantage of our company package: free health benefits, all dental costs covered, and paid vacation with all expenses covered by us.” Overall, I believe that things will work out well eventually. And in the meantime, I look forward to three things in the weeks ahead: lunch with my former supervisor and the secretary, an appointment that I scheduled with a career advisor to review my resume, and lastly GRADUATION! (25 more days).

Friends aren't always good

Coming to the end of my internship is getting really sad and having to say goodbye to fellow co-workers already. This week I did much of the same with writing my weekly emails highlighting students. I did notice however now having friends and being able to talk to my co-workers has harmed my working ethics. I have begun to get distracted by talking and researching jokes that we all have instead of doing my emails. Although I do get them done I have slacked in the timely manner I do them in. It has made me realize how to spend my time at a job and reevaluate what is important whenworking and enjoying others company. I've trying to take that into consideration from now on when doing my work with others around me and having a boundry up so I am able to do my work better since I can't do work well unless I have no distractions. Other than that nothing too new has been happening since I am coming to the end I haven't been starting new projects or anything but have gone back to doing the things I began with then I first entered my internship.

Job Search continues/Photo Shoot Next Week at Internship!

This past week, I have not had too much time to put into the job search process, because I have been busy dealing with school and other issues. It is frustrating because I am worried that I am not going to get everything done that I need to. My friend's mom has been reaching out to me with possible job options, but I have not even had the time to look at them yet, and I feel terrible.
I did not go to my internship this past Tuesday, either. I decided to stay home because I needed to catch up on sleep (had been sleep deprived all weekend because I took a trip to Montreal with the MIT band for our annual tour). I am so glad that I have the flexibility to go in to my internship whenever I want to; I don't skip very often, but I am not stressing out because my hours are completed.
This week should be exciting at my internship, however. I will be involved in a photo shoot! I have never done this before, so it will be an interesting experience. The Lesley Internship Office reached out to me a while ago because they wanted me to do a photo shoot at my internship; it would go in the brochure. It was a cool opportunity to take, and I am really excited about it. It took a lot of time to finally set a date, however, and I was worried that the shoot would never happen. Luckily, the Marketing Department emailed me this past week and we set the date and time. Hopefully all goes well and I represent the Citi Performing Arts Center and Lesley well. 

Embracing the Calm Before the Storm

UNA-GB's largest event is coming up, April 27th to be exact, and as I've been through a few events that have been calm right before the few hours before the event this event blows the others out of the water. It is the biggest event we hold each year and as we now have less than a week left to prepare there seems to be a lot left to do and not enough time. The great thing about the people I work with is everyone knows how to keep their attitudes upbeat and more excited for the event then stressing about it, I realized that the less you worry and the more you enjoy all the tedious work but exciting work of the event you can enjoy the little steps it takes to make the whole thing a success. My internship has taught me quite a lot on how to prioritize my tasks as well as keep a clear and positive mindset while doing my work, even at the most stressful times.

Lets just hope this mentality can last for the week left of preparing!

Staff Meetings and Corporate Events

This week was actually really interesting and new to me. I was able to go to a staff meeting on Thursday, I usually opt out of the meetings but this meeting was larger and had the entire floor going so I decided I wanted to be a part of it and see a side of the company I hadn't. I am so happy I went to the meeting it engaged me in other aspects of the company I didn't know about and filled me in on other aspects I only knew a little about. Most importantly the meeting introduced and showed me more of what was going to be taking place that weekend, a Place-a-thon. After the meeting I went on to do my regular emails and helped do some arts and crafts projects for the place-a-thon. The place-a-thon was a 7 hour shift on saturday with a webcam in the office where host families, and field workers looking for host families, and international offices could view the office in Boston. The day was dedicated to finding as many host families for students as possible to try and make sure that all of the students anticipated to come this fall have homes. The webcasting also had short videos and music videos made by the employees at the office to keep the place-a-thon humourous and enjoyable with shout outs and prizes being awarded to people who called in throughout the day. So my second day of the internship was devoted to helping set up for the place-a-thon and making sure everything was ready from assembling flags to making a white board decorations to making prize wheel slots. It was all little tasks but it was fun and I got to work with a lot of people i have never met before from different departments. I wish I was able to stay at my internship longer than the school year to see how crazy it is going to get in the end months of students arriving and must having homes when they get here. I'm told its over 12 hour work days and lots of sweats in the office just because they are there so long ensuring all of the students have placements. I would love to see how my co-workers change and adapt for these hard and tiring times at the office but I think I am already starting to see the stress rise as we are entering summer. It is interesting watching the dynamics changing also as everyone is gaing stress.

Same as Usual

Hello world,

This week has been exciting, as the weather has come out to play. At my internship we have been doing roughly the same things. Facebook, google docs, tri-fold brochures, and a few other items. It was nice on Monday so as the office was being used for a client conversation my internship lady took me out for a walk to show me her garden. This was the first time that we had taken a break out of the office. Leaving the office for 10 minutes is such a stress reliever. When I start working a job I hope they will let us have an outside break pending on the weather. My internship is slowly coming to an end and I am excited to see what will happen to me after graduation.


Peace

Tenth Week

This last week focused more on marketing than anything... I covered a pretty large grid of a residential area in Somerville. I walked from mailbox to mailbox, going up a bunch of stairs at every house and dropping off an Outdoor Bootcamp flyer in each mailbox for every apartment in the house or complex. I passed out a whole box, and was surprised that it didn't last very long. I think there are more flyers that I can still pass out, but they go so fast that I don't think we ordered enough...

I'm excited for the Bootcamp and might be able to participate in some of the classes. 6AM... It's going to be killer, but it's healthy I guess. We're still waiting to hear back from a proposal we sent out for a new location. We're asking for a four month build-up period, and the owner might not want to wait that long when he could just rent it out to someone else and make money for all of month we'd be building up.

If he is okay with it, we're going to go over the lease with a lawyer because there are a bunch of things thrown into it that leave us completely liable for anything that goes wrong. After that, if he accepts the new terms, we need to ask for permit from the city and that's the thing that takes four months... So it's a waiting game at this point hoping he agrees to our terms. I'm still setting up interviews for future employees.

Thanks.

week 9

i've taken control of my internship almost entirely. I act almost like an employee there now. I come in during my normal hours and find my own work to do. The only thing that has been different is if they need someone to work sound on bands that are there playing live. I've basically been taking care of the same business as usual. I am past the point of needing to do hours for internship but i am still going to be going in to work.

Week 10

Today I was able to go to my internship and get some productive work done. One of the biggest ways the studio makes profit is by group training. It is essentially the same thing as a one on one personal training session but with one or two other people. The appealing part of it is that it is half the price of a one on one session and the benefits are just as good. So I was able to bring a friend in today and we shot demo videos which we will turn into a commercial to send out to our clients. This is more marketing practice and will hopefully bring in more revenue for the company.

Also we are still in the process of finalizing our "Walk on the Charles". I have created a poster to hang up in the studio and we will also create a video. Another helpful process of my internship is my supervisor is helping find an internship for the summer back in Rhode Island. Since I have enjoyed my work so much I would like to continue to work in the Fitness industry. I'm glad to know my work has been good enough to the point my supervisor wants to help me find another place to intern.

Networking

So Wednesday was pretty low key. I worked from home inputting more venues into the database. Just business as usual stuff. I found out more information about our new operations coordinator. Our new employee that Dan hired. I don't think dan is really leaning towards interns anymore. I think he really wants to get stuff done with more motivation. I actually had met this person from the time we came to pick up pieces from a venue and he was actually working at the local berry line. I was a little surprised that he just hired him as I feel that I possess the same qualities. I can understand though that I only come in part time.
So Thursday rolls around and they had finished shooting their promotional video which I found out was for a contest where you can win a mercedes pick up truck for your business by making a 90 second promotional video. So Dan actually only came in for about a half hour and we caught up on things. He gave me a new task to clean up profiles that weren't active on our site. I still had to finish the venue list first though.
So Dan actually shot the promo video with this guy named Anthony who came into the office to burn off a copy of the video. He lives in NYC so he was just there for the promo video. He is an incubator for startups which is really cool. He was showing me all these ideas he had for his company and some really great stuff. We interacted a lot and talked about many cool things. I found out Dan had lived in LA at some point with this guy and they became friends. Overall it was great to meet some great people as I also met his mother who worked with Microsoft. I learned a lot about them
*I actually had a bit of a disagreement with my supervisor this week. I recently just made an account on LinkedIn and I just let it go through and add people from my address book on my email/ facebook/ people you may know/ etc. So I get an e-mail from him saying that I shouldn't add I bunch of people I do not know and I remember him mentioning something about adding personal people. I told him I didn't purposely add anyone I just added people related to me, the business im linked to, and the field im interested in. We are supposed to make a note of it next time so I can show him how I did that but honestly I don't think it is a big deal and I don't care enough to go adding people personal to him. It was kind of awkward but I just don't want to make a big deal out of it.

Last week

Last week at my internship I continued to work on putting up new content on their website, and helped look for more people that they could invite to their inter belt programs. For the most part, I mainly focused on designing and putting up more content on their website. Which is something that I really enjoyed doing, they use a different website design program that I'm not familiar with but within these past weeks, I have gotten to figure out and its very easy to use now.

For the past two weeks, I've been really enjoying working on the website and learning how to upload and fix content. Some of the content that I've been working on is difficult and tedious to work with but I believe that it helps me better understand what goes on when designing the content that goes onto websites.

Job Search Continues

This past week, I had a job interview over the phone for a company called SalesQuest. The position I applied for was market research. It was my first one that I ever had, and they are certainly different than visiting the workplace. I liked not having to travel anywhere and taking hours making myself look presentable. I still needed to prep for the interview by learning about the company, but I also needed to make sure that I could be conversational over the phone. Obviously this can not be practiced in an hour; it takes time and practice. I think my skills talking on the phone have been improving a lot because I have found myself calling people on the phone the past few months instead of texting.
The interview lasted for about 40 minutes, which was pretty long but I think that was good. We seemed to have a good conversation. The woman asked me about myself and my resume; however since I never sent a cover letter (I applied on LinkedIn, where it was not required) she had less things to ask me. Since I never sent a cover letter, I have to write one. In addition, I also have to summarize a six page article in about four paragraphs. I am finding it really stressful to deal with school and applying for jobs. School is enough as it is, but to add finding a job next year is a lot because I don't want to be out of school for too long after I graduate. Even though it is a lot, I still feel determined that I can do it (and this will push me through the next stressful month). 

Blog# 11 Finish Line- The End

My time at the CRLS Athletic Department has come to an end as I've met the 120 hour requirement. I started the week off by going back and making changes to the schedules of some sporting events. My supervisor had informed me that some of the coaches wanted to cancel a few games and add new ones.So I spent my last week interacting with coaches on a daily basis regarding how to go about updating the database. Also, I did a PowerPoint presentation to a group of high school seniors regarding the college experience. I incorporated a great deal of my personal experiences of when I was a student-athlete in high school, and some of the techniques that I used to ensure that I was succeeding in both academics and sports: time management skills, the importance of eating healthy and getting 7-8 hours of sleep, building and maintaining a healthy relationship with professors and coaches etc. I also shared with them a few photos of myself in high school when I was into karate and fitness. I showed them pictures of tournaments I competed in and some of my black belt exam. I thought the presentation went very well.

Surprisingly, I wasn't nervous at all. I felt very comfortable because I knew that I could relate to the student-athletes; having been in their shoes before. My supervisor complimented me as well on a great job and asked to email my presentation to her so she could share it with the athletic council. The only thing that I was disappointed about, and my supervisor too, was that of 18 students who were supposed to attend, only five showed up. I could tell she was highly upset, but at 7:30am—I was not shocked. I mean, how many high school kids would attend a presentation that early in the morning? A part from the highlight of my last week, the most interesting of all was my last day (Friday). I got some Thank You cards for my supervisor, the secretary and another female employee whom I worked closely with throughout my time there. It felt good when everyone took turns to express how much I'll be missed, and how much they enjoyed my help in the office. I'm really going to miss them as well. I had such a wonderful experience working with CRLS. I've grown throughout my time here and as I told my supervisor-- Whatever job/ career I end up with in the future; I hope the environment and people I work with is similar to what I've experienced at CRLS.

Week 9

I did not have my internship yesterday due to the marathon. Last Wednesday I felt like I was trusted with more work than usual. I was given a few articles to upload to the website, I finished a long piece of mine, and I worked on a few shorter pieces for my manager. I enjoyed being busier, because usually I have a lot of down time that I would spend on social media sites. (My supervisor also complimented on the work I have been doing and said that opinion pieces are my "bread and butter"). I have realized that I enjoy working in an environment where I am more engaged in the process. I prefer a balance of alone time to get my work time and time to interact with coworkers about what needs to get done and how it should be approached.

 As the semester is wrapping up, I feel like I have learned a lot about myself and I have a better sense of the field I want to go into. I do not think I want to go into journalism down the line. I tend to be more successful when I am given something to write rather than finding something to write about. I am still struggling finding a news piece to cover.

Week Ten

This was a really exciting weekend at my internship. This Friday and Saturday was finally time for Belle of the Ball. On Friday I went to Simmons (the location of the event) at 3pm and staying until about 8 to prepare for the event. I was completely exhausted. I had no idea how much work these events were! When I get there we began working to set everything up for the event. The biggest task was getting all of the prom dresses into the gym from the Anton’s trucks. We used rolling carts to hang the dresses onto and had to wheel them from the truck, to the elevator, to the gym on the second floor. After all of the dresses were in the building we had to sort them by size and color. We also had to set up vendors’ tables as well as accessories and shoes. It may not seem like it but this was a lot of physical labor. 

We had to come back Saturday for the actual boutique day. I got there at about 9am and set myself up at the media/VIP table. Part of what I did for the morning was to get the VIP’s and vendors from the parking garage down the street and bring them to the event. This included some of our hairstylists, the Bruins Ice girls, and Patriot’s Cheerleaders. This was also a lot of work because it was running around on a hot day but trying not to appear as if I was tired or stressed and being as friendly as possible. Later I was asked to fill in as a “personal shopper” for a girl looking for a dress because we were extra busy. For this I just went around with a girl and help her pick out and try on dresses. This was difficult but so rewarding because she was really insecure and nervous and she ended up looking absolutely beautiful. She was so excited and grateful by the time she left. Other things I did were staying at the media desk to greet VIP’s or press and give them direction. I also just helped wherever I was need. On Saturday I was there from 9 until about 7. I was completely worn out but it was a great experience.

An interesting thing that I learned here was that I have strength in being friendly and professional around important people and that I was very willing to do whatever I could to help. I also learned that maybe event planning isn’t something that I would want to do because of how draining it is. I always thought that I would like to do something like that but after this weekend, as rewarding as it was, I’m not so sure. I think I may have more strength in an office and organizational setting than in a really physically demanding one.

My Worst Enemies, Distractions.

I realized that my worst distractions at my internship are social media on the Internet. When I'm not happy or bored at my internship I tend to go on Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest or anything else that will pass the time. I also realized the other interns have done the same; the era we live in today has made all of these social medias not even distractions but almost a basic need. We seem to have withdrawals when we don't check our social media pages, almost as if it was a dire need to make sure no ones written on our wall or mentioned us in their tweet since the last five minutes when we checked. I realized my need to be on the Internet and all these social medias isn't necessarily a distraction as much as it is a habit, almost as if I ask myself, "why am I on the computer but not on Facebook, Twitter or Pinterest?" The question is how do I change this habit, as technology and social media keeps enhancing?

Week 8

I had an interesting week at my internship. Usually I am not given assignments when I first walk in, and last week I was given two right off the bat. The first one was gathering statistic information because one of the pieces we received was not long enough. I scanned through the article and pulled out important numbers. I also did some additional research and went to the organization's page and pulled some statistics. I was not sure how much information my supervisor was looking for, so I tried to provide as much as I could. One of the other supervisors was asking help uploading calendar events to the website from the person sitting next to me. I had some experience doing the uploads, and since I had already finished the other assignment, I asked him if I could help.
It's interesting when things run smoothly in the work place, because I ended up learning more about the uploading process through the questions him and I asked each other. I usually like to work independently, but it is nice to be able to bounce ideas  and suggestions off of coworkers in order to get the work done more efficiently and in a timely manner. Although journalism does involve some collaboration, it is usually a fairly independent field of work. I think I enjoy the collaboration aspect more, because it brings a new dimension to the work place and also your work.

Struggles with Fbook

Hello Lesleyites,

This past week at my internship we have been working on facebook. My site supervisior has had a weak page in the past so for the past few times I've attended we have work strictly on hers. I have had issues with adding apps to my favorites. With the new timeline facebook is changing. It's hard to work out the kinks because the kinks are new. Does anyone have any facebook timeline knowledge? Can you tell me how to add apps to my timeline under my cover photo?

Peace and Chicken grease amigos!

Better week

This past week was a lot better than weeks before, I finally finished scanning all the interbelt project documents and pictures. That was a great relief because after finishing another project I'm getting closer to finally working on the website and market my online virtual tour.

After finishing all the scanning of the photos and documents, my internship supervisor quickly introduced me to the program that they use to edit and create their website. It's a little different from the website designing programs I've used in the past but I feel that it actually should be easier than those other programs. Hopefully next week I'll be working primarily for the rest of my time their on helping the Cambridge Historical Society design their website.

Week 9

Last week was pretty productive as I was able to outline pretty much what my last few weeks of my internship will consist of. For one instead of holding a competition for clients of the studio we changed our idea to holding "A Walk on the Charles". What this will consist of is we will all meet at a picked location along the Charles River. From there we will walk hopefully about two miles and on the walk we will stop several times and do some exercises with the clients. At the end of the walk we hope to find a local coffee shop to stop and just have a nice friendly chat with the clients. We hope this will be an effective way of having a more personal relationship with the clients.

Along with that I will continue updating the social media sites and trying to bring in more clients to the studio. This consists of reviewing the results of the survey which was sent out over the weekend and asked clients about their social media use. Once we compile the data we will be able to use it to gear our content more effectively. I am feeling good about what I have done so far and hope to finish the internship strong.

Ninth Week

The Seventh Week and Eight Week were hard to get anything done because my supervisors had to go to a business meeting to Mexico.

This week at the TR has been a little different than any of the rest. I went in to see what my supervisor could give me for work over the weekend and she gave me a list: Promote the Outdoor Bootcamp to sports stores around the area, put up a sign in Somerville, get in touch with my last internship supervisor about the Outdoor Bootcamp, and email two people that came in with resumes to set up interviews with.

I have reached out to sports stores in the area: Marathon Sports, City Sports, and a bike shop near my house. I'm going to go by later this week to pick up the flyers they ordered and going to take them to those stores as well as maybe drop some off at colleges around the area (Lesley, Tufts and Harvard). Their main customers are middle-aged adults that live in Somerville, so I'm going to be putting flyers in mailboxes probably on Friday.

I'm working on setting up the interviews for Friday. I also took the business cards that they used last year, but cropped out the "free class" and the prices (because they changed) and am using them to give to people for free classes as long as I sign the back of them. Hopefully the ones I give out come back and stay interested enough to actually do the Bootcamp.

I still need to talk to the City of Somerville because they cut down a sign we put up even though they said we could do one last year, and when we emailed them they never go back to us so we assumed it was okay this year too.

I'm really excited to see how I can help on growing the Bootcamp so we have at least 40 people coming in.

Same ole Same ole

I have been working on the same project over the last week.  Even though it has been the same project, I have been enjoying myself while creating the Student-Athlete Manual.  I am learning things that as a Student-Athlete I never really paid attention too.  It is also very interesting to see how another campus runs their athletics.

I am slowly winding down on my internship which will be ending around the end of the month.  It is crazy how fast the semester has flown by.  However I am graduating this May, which means the craziness continues for a few more weeks after finishing here.  I look forward to making my last few weeks at internship worth my time. :)

Week Nine

I had the week off from my internship but I do feel that I spend time doing valuable work for myself. I spent last week working on my resume and my LinkedIn profile. I also spent a lot of time thinking about what I might want to do. When I met with Professor Snyder to go over some point on my resume, we discussed the differences in experiences that I have, as well as in the options of careers I could go into. There are pros and cons to going into a large agency as well as into a smaller, more intimate work setting. I haven’t made any decisions as to which type of company I would like to go into, but I do feel like I have a clearer way of looking at it.

I am really looking forward to this coming week at my internship. I honestly miss the people I work with and seeing and helping them every week. This coming week is very busy because we have the Belle of the Ball event. It is taking place on Saturday at Simmons College. On Friday, I will go down to Simmons to help with the set up of the actual event. This will mean unloading, organizing, and setting up the dresses and booths. I know that this is going to be a lot of hard work but I think it will be a lot of fun. I am also planning on learning A TON from this experience. On Saturday, I’ll go to Simmons again for the actual boutique day. This will be great because I will see the event happening, which will be a very rewarding experience. I also have been assigned the job of helping Aidan with media relations, and taking the celebrities and other volunteers to their respective stations. This is a little scary but I’m really excited to have this experience to add to my resume.