Internship Assessment

I just want to start off with telling the story of how I got this internship because I thought think the connection that me and Dan had working together was mainly because of our past. As you read in the previous post Dan went to UP and worked for the Beacon. I was actually interviewing for a position in the Beacon and met a lady who had previously been a broadcaster so I explained to her what I wanted to do and she is friends with Dan and thought that it would be a good idea for him and I to get in touch.  A couple emails later I was going in to KOIN Local 6 for a meet/greet/interview.  A little later I found out I got the internship and was SO excited. At the beginning of the internship they sent out a questionnaire for all the interns to fill out and two of the questions were: 

What do you see yourself doing in 5 years?

I don’t think I can answer this question because to be honest, I really have no idea where I am going to be in 5 years. There are so many things I want to do before I settle down; I want to possibly go into the peace corp and I want to travel and play soccer for as long as I can. I am not one to plan out my future, more so just a long with it; we can’t always live our lives thinking about what we are going to do, we should think about what we are doing in present time.

What do you hope to get out of this internship?

I honestly just hope that I take away something from it. Whether that is using this internship to further my experience with broadcasting or whether it is finding out that maybe broadcasting is not for me. I think that this is such a good opportunity for me to learn. We can learn something from anything we do as long as we pay attention. I mean I work at Subway and I would have never thought I would learn as much as I have from working there. 

Now that it has come to the end of my internship I still agree completely with the first answer but would add the fact that it's okay to try things and not like them...that's why we do internships...to try things out !

As for the second question...answering it in present tense now "what did I get out of this internship?"

-I would say that I got to meet David Beckham and Charles Barkley...kidding! haha I definitely learned A LOT! I think that at first I was really nervous and it was difficult fully being myself but that changed real quick...I realized that being a good broadcaster is being yourself. I am an outgoing, loud, friendly, and personable person so I figured why not just let people know who I am and how I am going to be.  When I was meeting one of the head ladies I actually gave her sh** for not having enough sports on air and Dan looked at me and then at her and was like umm I didn't tell her to say that haha but hey I mean how else are you supposed to get your opinion out there and get recognized. I learned that "looks only get you till about 30 then you have to have brains too" which was interesting...one of the reporter ladies went off to me one day and I stood there took it and was so mad afterwards but realized that in every business there are going to be those people who don't like you and don't respect you and are just flat out mean. Now, I didn't expect for this to happen to me as an intern but it did and if anything it made me stronger as a person. I am me, and I'm gonna be me and no matter who says what or does what I am so determined that I won't let dumb things like that get in the way. As a communications major I also found that broadcasting is ALL communications. I mean I already know how awesome it is to be a comm major because I could apply everything now but it was also cool being able to see how it all applies to a potential job as well. A simple way of communicating can make or break a story. Asking someone a certain question wrong can make or break it. SO many factors can make or break it. I feel like there were many awkward encounters with people that I had to work through which have no taught me to deal with them much better. (I don't know if this is stereotypical of news rooms but the dudes in the back in editing an all that weird stuff...are interesting people to say the least haha). As far as where my attitude towards broadcasting, I am still trying to figure it out. I did enjoy all the times we went out to events but I don't think I could sit in a room all day writing stories I found on Newspaths and write stories on them to broadcast in another lame room. I definitely know that if I were to get into broadcasting that I would HAVE to be the one out in the world (not tv room) interviewing and interacting with people. KOIN is also not a sports channel an that is all I want to do so maybe it would take me doing an internship at a more sports specific channel...I'm not sure yet. But, I am sure that I learned so much at this internship and I will take all of this with me for future internships and jobs.

Total Hours: 158 Hours