Published: May 08, 2008 06:53 pm            

EDITORIAL: Interning: The opportunity of a lifetime

There’s something to be said about internships. It used to be that college students were encouraged to do at least a summer of interning to learn about the field they wanted to go into. After all, what use is a degree if you graduate and then decide the job you thought you wanted really isn’t for you?

Now, high schools are doing a lot of the encouraging. Earlier this year the Journal-Register took on a high school intern from Albion, Kristen Palmer, and she’s learned and grown as a writer, uses her few hours here a week efficiently and is never afraid to pick up the phone to check information or ask if there’s something she can help with.

Wednesday night, Orleans County Chamber of Commerce Executive Director Kelly Kiebala introduced their intern, Mike Hughson, also from Albion, to the crowd gathered for the annual meeting and awards at Hickory Ridge.

One thing is clear, from working with Kristen to listening to Mike speak about his time with the Chamber — interning is an awesome experience.

“I really learned all that I could at high school,” Mike said during his speech. With the opportunity provided to him though Albion’s internship coordinator Maura Pierce, he was able to branch out and see what happens on a daily basis at the Chamber’s base of operations.

His experiences include becoming the “copy master and vending machine master,” he said, but more than that he’s learned to manage his time effectively and has built a relationship with the Chamber — which Mike said he knew nothing about when he started there.

Kiebala said he’s been a huge asset to the office and comes to work everyday with a smile on his face. In the fall, Mike will be attending Fredonia and plans to major in math and economics, taking with him the time management skills and everything else he’s learned since September.

Like Mike, Kristen has been able to dig into the field she’d like to work in. We hope, like those who have come to us to learn in the past, that she’ll take this experience with her to Houghton in the fall and into a long and fulfilling career.

There truly is no experience like interning and we encourage students — high school and college — to take advantage of the opportunities out there to learn about the things you may want to do with your future. It sure beats undergrad work for four years just to say, “This isn’t for me.”

        

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