Everyone Should Do an Internship!
As a Communications major, I had an important decision to make during my senior year: what would I do for my internship?
I enjoyed everything about media. Radio was my favorite thing, but after my disastrous attempt at being a Sunday morning disc jockey, unable to pronounce even one classical music legend’s name, I thought I should consider television – behind-the-scenes.
I’d have been happy doing anything and everything in television. But Mount Union didn’t have a TV station – even though the department head told me they would soon and “might even have one before you graduate!” … that didn’t happen. From my research, Mount Union didn’t start broadcasting student shows until this year.
Fortunately creative writing really sparked my interest, but I thought journalism was the only way to go to start a “career.” I’d thoroughly enjoyed election night at the radio station, and I loved working on the campus newspaper. So I considered working for a newspaper.
Everyone knows – now especially – that internships are vital to having a successful career right after graduation. It’s got something to do with having experience on the resume, instead of no experience. People hiring employees generally appreciate some form of experience.
But I was a biker chick. My experience was three weeks at The Gap and two summers at Kennywood. I’d had three years’ worth of classes providing me with virtually zero practical knowledge, and I certainly wasn’t using the wisdom of my elders to help me build a career path.
While other Communications majors were building their portfolios, working campus jobs in marketing and admissions, talking about careers with their professors, and interviewing and interning at local media outlets, I was drinking myself into oblivion every single day.
I was a drunk. I’d transformed from being Dean Davis’ problem drinker two years prior into a full-fledged alcoholic. I’d stepped over that invisible line. I was a daily drinker with no interest in doing anything, let alone work. I wanted to drink, get drunk, fall down, pass out, wake up and do it again. That was the extent of my ambition.
Fortunately for me, Mount Union College did not care if I did an internship. The college “encouraged” it by saying (probably frequently): “Everyone should do an internship!”
But they gave me an option, and that option was by far the easier, softer way.
In order to graduate, we needed to do an internship … or take a special class.
So I took the special class. I don’t remember the name of the class, nor do I know the subject matter that was covered. I don’t know when that class took place, or for how many hours of my week. I just know that the class was taught by Chuck Morford, the Communications chair and the man who had once promised me a TV station.
And while I hate to speak ill of the dead, all of Chuck Morford’s courses bored me. Listening to him instead of working actually made interning seem fun, even for a student who didn’t want to get out of bed in the morning.
I had a friend in that non-internship class, Marti, who was very, very, very funny. As she’d done in most of the classes we had together, Marti helped keep me awake and made those hours bearable. Sometimes I think Marti is the reason I stuck with Communications. It certainly wasn’t Chuck Morford.
That class was dreadful. I just dragged my butt into a seat, sat there, and then left. I learned nothing; I did nothing.
And that was just what I wanted.