Just a quick program note; this will be our last semester blogging at WordPress.com. This January, The AU Intern blog will move to american.edu and take up its new home as one of the inaugural blogs at blogs.american.edu. You can go ahead and take a peek a the new site and some advice from our staff at intern.blogs.american.edu.

If you or someone you know is interested in sharing and reflecting upon your internship next semester, let us know now. Just email Francine Blume, AU Career Center Director of Experiential Education, or shoot a tweet @aucareercenter.

Something that I learned from my experience was to not limit myself to my major. Because I locked in so fast I was unable to change my major and still graduate in four years, what with taking a whole year to go abroad. But that abroad experience and my experience working for the yearbook have been the best experiences that I have had in college.

As I prepare to graduate in the spring I will take with me all of the lessons learned in college. I assure you, most of them were not learned in the classroom. So if you get the opportunity to intern, take it. But take it for the right reasons. And use it to learn more about yourself. You never know what you might find.

Best wishes, everyone.

During the course of my time here, I have gained a much deeper appreciation for the very specific problems and pitfalls faced by local governments everywhere, at a level of specificity I never imagined possible.  I have previously blogged here about very, VERY particular problems faced by governments that I got to learn about the nature of while also learning how one might go about fixing or solving them, and that made for a very interesting experience indeed.  The biggest benefit to being involved with the new Knowledge Network here was being at the nexus of so many different initiatives, from public safety improvement initiatives to international development work, to everything in between.  It was all routed through the website, and our users asked questions about all manner of concerns, both within the work that ICMA has already gotten involved in, and to other areas which we hadn’t even considered before; it all made for a dynamic work environment.  Having the office building itself be located near Union Station was also a great aspect to an internship for an AU student (it is on the Red Line of the Metro, and not very far from Tenleytown, making working half a day on Tuesdays this fall, followed by class in the evening, a viable possibility).  In many ways, I learned quite a lot at ICMA, and am grateful for the opportunity to have been there.  Tellingly, amongst the most important lessons learned were those of “yes I do want to work in a non-profit of some sort” and the same time “no, I do not want to work in government at any level,” just based on closely learning what is involved (I like traveling too much to stay in one place!).

Finally, though I will have to edit this in upon publication in the coming weeks, the following is the link to my final publication from ICMA, regarding Cell Phones and Direct Democracy, is as follows:

(link forthcoming in early 2011)

Thanks to the AU Career Center for allowing me to blog here, and good luck to all those in-progress and prospective interns out there!

Overall, this has been such a wonderful experience. I loved working for Amnesty International, and I believe they gave the facilitators excellent support and resources. My favorite part has been working with the students. They have really pulled at my heartstrings. Our one and one conversations have often been very powerful, and I hope the students enjoyed the lessons. It has been a challenge as well, figuring out the lesson plans took a long time. Also, you never knew where the class discussions would go, and often times the conversations went from heated to inappropriately contentious. Regardless, I will really missing seeing the students every Friday!!!

Thank you for reading these posts!

Disclaimer: As always, the opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of Amnesty International or the HRESC program. This blog is purely the opinions of Rosemarie Treanor.

Just a quick post on my final Amnesty International HRESC training session which occurred on Saturday, December 4. I couldn’t believe another month had gone by! It was really good to meet up with the other facilitators and discuss our different experiences. Although all of us work at Cardozo and Anacostia, we all have had very special and unique movements with our classrooms. Everyone in the DC area should come to the celebration of Human Rights Day at Busboys and Poets Saturday the 11^th at 6:30! Should be a great time for a worthy cause!

Disclaimer: As always, the opinions expressed here do not necessarily reflect those of Amnesty International or the HRESC program. This blog is purely the opinions of Rosemarie Treanor.

I’m going to write a final post tomorrow, wrapping up all my work and my experience at Citysearch, but I wanted to drop in some “internship tips” before I headed out. These tips are the benefit of three internships: my knowledge (or the little that I claim to have– I’m not the Intern Queen!) comes from all three.

1. Be honest with yourself. Don’t take an internship for the prestige. You’ll just end up resenting it.

2. Push yourself. Use your internship as a learning opportunity, not just an opportunity to network or to gain “real world experience.”

3. Understand that an internship often involves a lot of useless time. Take a book or some homework, and use it.

4. Know that even when you make mistakes, even when you make the wrong decision you can learn from it.

And finally…

5. Pursue what you love. What you want is the only thing that matters. Yes, it sounds cheesy, but it’s so true. We’ll chat more about this in my last post.
Best of luck to all applying to internships for the spring!

Life and work at the Fund for Peace has been great! Over the past thirteen weeks, I participated in a number of interesting projects. Under the guidance of my supervisor, I worked on several ongoing initiatives, including UNLock, CAST and the FfP website. Through this process, I was able to sharpen my research skills, hone my analytical abilities and contribute in a meaningful way to the FfP’s mission.

Personally, I found the internship at an optimal time in my academic career. In my Development Management class at American University, I was assigned to a small group whose assignment was to create a Request for Proposal for an education system in Southern Sudan. While we did not work directly with Sudan at the FfP during this term, I was still able to take information gathered and techniques learned here at the office and directly apply them to my final project.

Overall, I believe my experiences here were beneficial on not only a professional level, but on an academic one as well. I also consider the FfP as a strong foundation upon which I can start to build a career in the international development field. As I move forward with a think tank position in the Spring, I am grateful for the hands-on experience, research and ongoing analytic work in which I participated at the FfP!

And, now, onto winter break!!

I could go on a rant about riding the constantly broken and slow DC metro (where does all my money GO????), or about how much I love the musically inclined homeless people who serenade all the K St. nine-to-fivers at Farragut North during rush hour, but I think I’ll just say farewell and wish you the best in your future jobs and internships.

Remember to never put your bag on the metro seat next to you because no one should have to ask you to move it, always smile and greet the doorman at your office– someone you see every day should be a friend, and for heaven’s sake take the stairs if you work in an office building– you are in the best shape you’ll ever be in!!  Good luck out there, kick *** on your exams, and have a wonderful holiday.

1. At Citysearch, I work at home. So, so different. I’m definitely not used to just pulling myself out of bed in time to long online. Benefits: working from anywhere, avoiding the morning commute, not having to get dressed. Bummers: Not having anyone to talk to all day long.

2. Workload. Everywhere I have worked has had a different workload. At Citysearch my work depended on whatever I was assigned for the week, and this changed after my supervisor changed.

3. Communication. Again, working online means communicating virtually, for the most part at least. This leads to a wide variety of situations, particularly those where you are left wondering: is my boss satisfied? Because I can’t tell from that email.

4. Motivation. Most importantly, it takes a lot of self-effort to work at home all day and to actually get something done. TV, the kitchen, books, the paper I should’ve written last week… it’s all very distracting.

All in all, I learned something from each and every one of my internships. There are things I am proud of and things I wish I could go back in time and change, but I am grateful for all the opportunities D.C. has afforded me. Just two posts to go, so I’m wrapping it up for you!