Tag Archives: intern

Marketing internship provides applicable work experience

Megan Nelson is a student at St. Mary-of-the-Woods College in Terre Haute, Indiana. She is an employee at Lake Land College (LLC) in Mattoon, Illinois.

The goal of my internship was to use online marketing to increase the college’s non-traditional audience, expand its brand, and get noticed on the Internet. Part of my assignments involved using avenues like Google AdWords to reach this goal. I spent the majority of my first two weeks researching Google AdWords and how it worked before I determined the best way to learn was to “dive in head first” and create one. I generated three text ads on AdWords and conceptualized a single video ad to reach adult students from start to finish. I also explored the possibility of advertising on Pandora Radio by gathering demographic information and creating a survey via SurveyMonkey.com  to help determine if that opportunity would be worth the investment.

During …

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Internship helps solidify career goals

This is a guest post by Constance Chasteen, former intern at Summersville Regional Medical Center. She is a computer information systems student at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College in Wabash Valley, Ind.

For my internship, I was asked to either revamp or rebuild Summersville Regional Medical Center’s Intranet site. Since their existing Intranet was only partially completed using Microsoft FrontPage 2003 (an outdated Web building program), I decided to implement a Content Management System (CMS) that could develop along with them.

I took into account that budgeting can be a struggle at small community hospitals.  Therefore, I decided to use WordPress as the CMS of choice. It is a free, open source CMS with many plug-ins to expand functionality to meet the hospital’s growing needs. Because others may need to modify what I have done, I did not want it to be excessively hard to use.

There was really no place for …

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Employers: A New Age of Internship Possibilities

I invite you to clear your mind of any pre-conceived notions about internships. Now, more than ever, employers have options when selecting an intern to fit your company’s particular needs. The word “internship” is expanding to include all types of structured and supervised experiential learning beyond the traditional 12-week college internship. Each type offers a distinct approach that can produce innumerable benefits for your organization, the student and our state.

Maybe you’ve dismissed the idea of hosting an intern because you don’t have the resources to manage a semester-long office internship. Or maybe your company’s work lends itself to a different internship approach. There are several new internship trends that can address specific goals you have, help you tap into fresh talent and even recruit full-time employees. There are also different demographics you can consider for internships beyond the 20-year-old college student.

New Types

‱ Virtual internships: Low on office …

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From intern to full-time employee

There is no better case for the value of internships than the rate at which they lead to full-time jobs. According to the National Association of Colleges and Employers, approximately 60 percent of 2012 college graduates who held paid internships received at least one job offer. Today, I join that group.

I began a full-time, paid internship in September with Indiana INTERNnet, a program managed by the Indiana Chamber of Commerce. This was my second post-graduate internship, following three months spent at the Indiana State Fair. I’ll admit that even I – a huge advocate for internships – was a little leery of doing a second post-graduate internship.

One of our mantras at Indiana INTERNnet is “Intern Today, Employee Tomorrow.” We say it because it’s often true.

After about two months into my internship with Indiana INTERNnet, I was offered a full-time job with the Indiana Chamber as an assistant …

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The Forty-Year-Old Intern

This is a story by Felicia Edlin that ran in the Little Pink Book newsletter on Nov. 7, 2012.

“If you don’t like the road you’re walking, start paving another one.” – Dolly Parton

Not so long ago, internships were reserved for college students. That’s changing.

With high unemployment rates, many women are switching careers with the help of internships to learn fresh skills and widen their network.

These days, mid-career internships are viewed as an investment to a new career, not as a regression. Ideally, an internship could lead to a full-time position.

If not, it’s a way to keep up skills in between jobs.

Career expert J.T. O’Donnell says in-depth discussions with mentors and career advisors are essential to discovering what you are interested in.

O’Donnell suggests digging deeper into why you want to make the transition. Mid-career internships are most successful for those who plan a way …

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Internship experience builds confidence, skill sets

This is a guest post by Nicole Francis, former intern at the Council on Domestic Abuse, Inc. (CODA) in Terre Haute. She is a psychology student at Saint Mary-of-the-Woods College.

The goal of an internship at CODA is to gain a greater understanding of the field of social services by working to empower survivors of domestic violence.  After the intern successfully completes the training program, interns begin to work at the emergency shelter, transitional housing or the CODA courthouse office.

Some of the things that I did during my internship experience include: talking to the residents, listening and letting residents voice their concerns to me. I was not confined to one area because there are several cordless phones in the house, which allowed me to move about the residence and be prepared for any calls at the same time.  Interns were able to work in the donation room, linen closet, …

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Discovering your career path, Part IV

This is the final installment of the series discussing methods to narrow down what jobs you’d like to pursue post-graduation. For previous entries, see personality, exploratory coursework and career aptitude tests.

You wouldn’t buy a car without taking it for a test drive. You wouldn’t marry someone without getting to know them.

Why would you jump into a career without first completing an internship or a similar form of experiential learning?

Experiential learning is a key step in your career development and is becoming less of an option and more of a necessity (see this USA Today College story). Not only can you “test drive” a career, but you acquire skills and complete real-world work in addition to what you learn in the classroom.

With that said, the goal is not to land just any internship. As you begin your search, there are several factors you want to keep in …

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Avoid ‘scary’ intern personas

Happy Halloween! Though your internship supervisor is likely expecting (and maybe even looking forward to) frights and scary surprises tomorrow, you don’t want to be one of them in the workplace.

Make sure your Halloween costume doesn’t symbolize your internship persona! Here are some scary internship characteristics to avoid:

The Werewolf Intern:  An employer’s nightmare! This intern looks fantastic on paper and interviews extremely well. He or she promises a great work ethic and the ability to help implement improvements within the organization. But when the full moon rises
 or rather, when the intern is hired, he or she morphs into something unexpected and undesirable. Make sure you live up to what you advertise on your rĂ©sumĂ© and in your interview.

The Frankenstein Intern:  An intern who may act like they were born yesterday (eek!). You are smart, creative and accomplished for someone your age; that’s why an employer tapped …

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Discovering your career path, Part I

This is Part I of a four-part series discussing ways to narrow down what jobs you’d like to pursue post-graduation.

“So, what do you want to do after you graduate?”

It’s a question you’ve probably fielded several times in your life. It’s a difficult one to answer, especially at the ripe old age of 19 or 20. You may have your major solidified, but many fields of study open up an infinite number of career possibilities. How can you narrow it down?

A good place to start is with an in-depth personality test, such as the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI) assessment. Through a series of preference and situational questions, the test breaks your personality down into four categories that dissect what makes you tick. It’s a little eerie how this test knows you better than you know yourself!

By understanding how you function and how you naturally approach situations, …

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The intern experience at myCOI

This is a guest post by Kyle Vail, a marketing intern at myCOI. Kyle is a 2012 graduate of Indiana University Bloomington and is from Greenfield, IN.

I am 23 and fresh out of college. I am not afraid to admit that I’m still a little unsure about what I think I will or should be doing for the rest of my life. I completed a Business Economics degree in May, but never really decided on a clear career path. I just knew I loved ideas and the work it takes to make them a reality. Knowing that, the opportunity to join the myCOI team in July as an intern was an easy and rewarding decision.

Working at myCOI as a Marketing Intern means collaborating with a creative, forward-looking team; a team that is always looking to better their product and service by focusing on end users. When a problem arises, there …

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Bright prospects for Class of 2013

It seems the Class of 2013 has much to look forward to once their tassels are turned. According to the National Association of Colleges and Employers (NACE), employers expect to hire 13 percent more new college graduates from this school year than they did from the Class of 2012 (see Job Outlook 2013).

Take a look at what jobs are most in demand:

Source: NACE Job Outlook 2013

How can you meet representatives from companies in these and other industries? Career fairs at your school’s campus are a great place to start. Visit your school’s career services office and check out the Events Page on our website for opportunities near you.

When you do attend a career fair, you will get much more from it if you are prepared. Check out this post about Do’s and Don’ts at career fairs.

Here are five tips to make the most of …

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Tips for balancing your internship and classes

One of the first skills college students learn is how to juggle. Classes, homework, social engagements… something’s got to give, right, if you add an internship to the mix? Not at all! Time management and organization are the solutions, and here are some tips to help you succeed.

4.   Be more organized than you’ve ever been with your coursework. You don’t want to be cramming for exams and trying to work a job at the same time. That school stress will follow you to work and chip away at your productivity and performance. For your classes, build your study materials as you go rather than frantically compiling them right before an exam. Refresh yourself on course material at the end of every week. A great online tool for this is called Quizlet, where you can make virtual study guides, flashcards and study games. You can share information with classmates, you …

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Search Scholars: A new kind of internship program

(Click above to view our video featuring Slingshot SEO)

Although Slingshot SEO is just six years old, its prominence in Indianapolis and the “search industry” is unparalleled. Slingshot provides search engine services for nearly 150 clients. With the evolution of search and the nature of constant change in the search industry, Slingshot relies on young professionals to fulfill their clients’ needs.

Slingshot SEO has launched a new-and-improved internship program called the “Search Scholars.” The company hosts interns in every department, including sales, marketing, client success, SEO consulting, search media, IT and human resources.

The program now includes:

1-2 résumé-worthy projects Mentor program Networking development A unique intern group project Variety of trainings for professional and personal growth Weekly structured meetings Final presentations at the conclusion of their internship

You may apply for Slingshot internships using Indiana INTERNnet, but we’d encourage you to check out Slingshot’s website, too. Best of …

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First-time intern gets top-notch experience at Juvenile Detention Center

This guest post is from Krista Rangel, a St. Mary-of-the-Woods student majoring in Criminal Justice and minoring in Sociology and Psychology. Krista will graduate in 2013.

My internship at Chicago Juvenile Detention Center was not only my first internship, but I was also the first intern to my site supervisor. I can honestly say this was one of the best experiences I have ever had. I learned about so many facets of the system — from the judges to simply being in the building; I would not have been able to gain these hands-on experiences in a classroom.

My internship at the detention center allowed me to see the system’s process first-hand. Working in a big building with a bunch of lawyers and judges was initially intimidating because I had never been in a corporate environment. After a few weeks, I got to know some of my co-workers and realized that although they have “big …

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Unexpected “Internduction”

This is a guest post written by Collin LaMothe. Currently, he interns for the Wellness Council of Indiana. He recently graduated from Ball State University with a degree in Creative and Professional Writing. He hopes to find a job where he can expand creatively—traveling, meeting new people, and writing about his own experiences.

My name is Collin LaMothe, and I am a cubicle intern.

This wasn’t my first intern gig. When I was accepted at the Wellness Council of Indiana, I couldn’t help but wonder what an out-of-shape guy like me was doing in an organization promoting health. I suppose it felt a little ironic, but my background in creative writing and design qualified me to lend some help with the main website redesign. So I signed-on for the summer, with the terms laid out plainly from day one.  I was here to assist and, most importantly, renovate http://www.wellnessindiana.com before August …

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