Being an intern doesn’t just mean pouring coffee anymore.
Planning city-wide children’s events, being an extra on TRL, presenting event ideas to an entire department and transcribing shoots are some of the opportunities had while being an intern at the MTV network.
Becky Krause ’09, a new media television and English creative writing double major, interned this past summer at MTV News and Sara LaFauci ’09, a communications and English professional writing double major, is currently interning at Nickelodeon, which is also under the umbrella of MTV Networks.
Many students opt to do an internship during college, whether they do so through Career Planning, their individual departments or a personal contact. Internships are beneficial in building resumes and give exposure to what a particular career will be like – and in some cases, they can even be fun.
“I was thrown right into the real world of news production and given responsibilities from day one,” said Krause. “This was no job sitting in a two-by-four cubicle staring at a blank wall all day. The intern desk was located right on the news floor and it was always teeming with activity.”
While Krause’s main responsibilities were assisting various producers, writers and editors in transcribing tapes and doing research, she also got to chat with the MTV News VJs and participated in interesting projects.
“I got to embarrass myself by dancing to the song ‘Chicken Noodle Soup’ on the MTV Web site,” she said. “It was for a show called ‘Dancers from the Hood,’ so people could learn how to do various hip-hop dances.”
LaFauci, who got the contact information for her internship from her English adviser, said that interning in the public affairs department at Nickelodeon has been a positive experience.
“When I came to Nick in mid-September, I jumped right into their ‘Let’s Just Play: Go Healthy Challenge’ campaign, which coincides with ‘Worldwide Day of Play’ on September 29,” said LaFauci. “I helped organize a Worldwide Day of Play event at New York City’s Riverside Park. After that, I began working on Nick’s current environmental campaign to encourage kids to ‘go green.'”
LaFauci said that creativity is important in her career.
Most of what she does is brainstorming possible activities and programs and presenting them to the department.
Krause also credited creativity as one of the most important skills needed at her internship; she also noted that a good sense of direction is significant.
“Sometimes I would cringe when asked to go on a run to deliver something just because I was so bad with directions,” she said.
“I would get on the first train that came because I didn’t realize the difference of uptown and downtown. One time I got really lost and I was starving and didn’t have time to take a lunch break, so I went into a random buffet on the corner and grabbed some food to eat while running. I sat momentarily on someone’s stoop to catch my breath and get a few mouthfuls of calamari, but I got a lot of weird looks,” she added.
While it was fun to interact with other MTV interns and employees, Krause said the internship gave her a great real world perspective on what she is learning in her production classes at Fairfield.
“I learned so much – everything on how to set up lights on a shoot to dealing with people in general to just observing and taking part in how the whole news production works. I wouldn’t trade the experience for anything – not even a nice piece of brownie chocolate pie, and if you know me, you know how much I like my pie,” she said.
Students in other academic departments at Fairfield also said that internships have been beneficial.
Alina Sysak ’08, a finance major, did an internship through the school last semester at the Merrill Lynch office in Fairfield. Her main responsibility was planning
programs for her supervisor in order for him to gain new clients.
“I was doing more marketing work, and though I didn’t see too much of the finance side of things in my work, my supervisor did take the other intern and myself aside from time to time to go over recent market trends and things like that,” said Sysak.
LaFauci also advised students to talk to their internship supervisors about their responsibilities and goals.
“Once you have secured your internship, don’t be afraid to be assertive and set expectations with your internship director,” she said.
Although Sysak’s internship at Merrill Lynch did not necessarily pertain to what she was learning in her finance classes, she said that internships can still give valuable insight into the working world.
“I got a clearer sense of what I wanted to do in the finance field after that, and it wasn’t what I was doing at Merrill, but it was still a good experience and I would do it again,” she said.
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