Office of Campus Diversity and Student Leadership Summer Intern
June - August 2018 • Amherst, MA
What I liked
I appreciate my internship because I was given an opportunity to educate myself on important principles of social justice work in a community of supportive and thoughtful directors and fellow interns. The community I was a part of over the summer contributed to a great deal of personal growth for me with regard to how I interrogate my identity and how I show up in social justice spaces. I am also grateful to have worked with the aim of supporting DACA and undocumented, first generation, low-income, transfer, and veteran students on Amherst's campus. My work was incredibly fulfilling and my energy and time spent on it was well worth it.
What I wish was different
I feel that the educational component of the internship could have focused more on issues of ableism and classism. The educational piece of the internship has proven to invaluable for me, however, I feel that the topics of ableism and classism required more attention during the summer.
Advice
I think that it is important to find an internship with a quality community of workers. My summer was most largely impacted by the people I was in community with. My experience of growth is linked to the people who helped me grow and the space and support they provided.
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Summer Digital Humanities Fellow
July - August 2018 • Amherst, MA
What I liked
I loved having the freedom to decide, design and develop my own individual project. I loved working in the Digital Programs department
What I wish was different
The scope of the fellowship.
Advice
Do somethings that's important to you.
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Geology Lab and Field Research Assistant
January 2018 • Amherst, MA
What I liked
My work felt really important because we were discussing the causes of mass extinctions with an approach that is fairly new to geological research. My professor made sure that all of us working in the lab were not just making progress in the data collection, but analyzing and understanding what our data meant.
I am also grateful for the opportunity to travel to Montana to do field research, because practical application solidifies the theoretical skills we learn in the classroom.
What I wish was different
I wish I had been able to spend more time on each. I only spent two weeks doing the extinction lab work, and although I am still working on it now, there is less concentrated time to focus solely on that work. The progress is now much slower.
Advice
When it comes to lab research, it can be really easy to solely focus on the manual work and to forget the meaning of the work being done, especially if one does not have the expertise to completely understand the studies that founded that work; I, for example, did not have the strongest background in chemistry, and I had to put in more time and effort to understand the isotopic relationships that were used in previous studies surrounding my research topic. However, I highly recommend putting in the extra time to try to learn the extra math, science, or even history surrounding one's topic. Although it may require a few hours out of work, understanding your work makes you more committed and devoted, and the work becomes more interesting.
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Researcher
June - July 2018 • Amherst, MA
What I liked
Having my own project, since I was starting up my thesis lab work.
What I wish was different
Learning to get around in a lab right before the move to the science center was not ideal.
Advice
Summer is a great time to get ahead on thesis work, and having your own thesis project can be very nice.
