Looking Back/Overall Insight

I think one of the biggest things I didn’t expect, but found that the University of Michigan prepared me for, was the high expectations my employers had for me. Going into this internship, I expected that I would be participating in pretty much “interny” type things. However, I soon realized that the tasks I was completing were the same types of jobs that my coworkers were doing. Instead of intern tasks I was actually doing publicity coordinator tasks. Initially I was flattered that they held me to such high standards, but when I first started to make minor mistakes I got frustrated that they expected so much from me. I figured that if I was an intern they shouldn’t expect me to perform like a paid employee. But when I finally got over the frustration, I realized that the experience I was getting as an “intern-like-coordinator” was far greater than the experience I would have gotten purely as a “classic intern.” I think that the University of Michigan really prepared me for this because I feel like Michigan really holds us to high standards. I successfully learned to utilize the resources around me and asked for help at the appropriate times in order to stop making the same mistakes over again. Looking back at my internship experience, I would have been so incredibly bored if I was doing what one would think of as a normal internship. I have gained such great life experience from this summer internship and learning to overcome frustrations and difficulties has only helped me to grow as a person.