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Internship Reflection Paper

Emilia Richter

Office of Health Promotion

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Introduction

My name is Emilia Richter, and I was interning with the Georgia College Office of

Health Promotion located at the Wellness and Recreation Center, as well as with GC

Adventure Programs. GC Health Movement’s goal is to promote health in various areas on

campus, such as physical health, mental health, sexual health. We also educate students on

healthier behaviors in regard to alcohol and drugs on campus. Me and Ashley Barfield,

another intern in the office, are responsible for planning events, which encompasses coming

up with ideas that will engage as many students as possible, build a good and balanced

schedule for all the events, calculate budgets, order equipment and resources, and eventually

do the event. The population I was working with were college students. They are at several

risks related to their health. For most students moving to college is the first time they live

away from their parents and have more responsibility for themselves. As there is easy access

to alcohol, drugs, and parties, students might feel the freedom to try those, or they might feel

peer-pressured because it is considered ‘cool’ to party and drink alcohol. Additionally, sexual

health is at risk because unfortunately many students engage in risky behaviors, such as no

use of proper protection during sexual activity. Only being around 18 years old when coming

to college, students might still be in the process of finding themselves and they are very

susceptible to adapting to the people and environment around them. This can lead to students

being influenced by their peers and being engaged in high-risk behaviors. Lastly, college can

pose a lot of stress and pressure on students. High cost and the expectation to succeed can

have a major influence on student’s mental health. My organization is trying to educate

students on these high-risk behaviors and to promote a variety of health areas, such as

physical, nutritional, mental, and sexual health.

The other organization I was working with was GC Adventure Programs. This organization

provides students with the opportunity to participate in outdoor activities, such as kayaking or
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hiking, as well as indoor activities, such as climbing a rock-wall and several clinics. For GC

Adventure Programs my job was to work at the rock-climbing wall which is open Monday

through Thursday 6-10pm at the Wellness Center. I helped checking people in, gave them the

right equipment, and made sure climbers followed safety rules.

Description of Experiences

My role as an intern was to create a variety of health promoting materials, such as

flyers, posters, and social media posts. Through the JED campus, Georgia College has

become part of a 4-year mental health campaign, which requires the Office of Health

Promotion to design a series of posters containing information on mental health resources the

school offers to students. Therefore, one of my roles was to keep the information and posters

up to date and change them every 3-4 weeks to keep raising awareness. The posters all have a

QR Code on them, which scanned with a phone, lead students to one website with all mental

health resources on and around campus. Another role of mine was to create a schedule with

health-promoting themes and events on campus for the whole semester. That way every week

had one specific topic, for example, nutritional health or sexual health that we would table on

or plan an event on. Our events were promoted during our tabling times which were twice a

week for 3 hours. At the table we would always have a flyer related to the health topic, as

well as goodies to grab or games to play for students, and, depending on if there was an event

coming up, a flyer for the event. Lastly, as I was also working with GC Adventure Programs,

my role was to help at the rock-climbing wall by checking people in and making sure

climbers were following safety rules.

The best part about my internship was meeting so many new and different people.

Being part of the tennis team, I have never really had a life outside of classes and tennis, and

I barely got to know people as I was busy all the time. The internship forced me to

communicate and work with other people which actually led to me being able to meet
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incredible people at the school. The most challenging part about the internship was the very

monotone daily routine and not having any free time. Once we had set up the schedule for the

semester, my weeks looked pretty much the same, which sometimes made me feel

underworked. I liked that I got to learn to be creative designing posters and buttons, but at

some point, it just got part of a routine, which I guess can be normal for a job, but I

personally prefer jobs that challenge me every day and make me feel like I am moving

forward more. I wish I had more diverse opportunities to take valuable lessons from, rather

than working with the same websites and resources every day.

Perception and Evaluation of the Internship

The internship mostly met my expectations since I had already worked with the

Office of Health Promotion for service-learning hours and knew what was expected from me.

One thing I didn’t expect to the extent I ended up experiencing, was the level of freedom of

what I had to contribute to work. My supervisor basically gave me and my coworker the job

and let us make all decisions. We would need to check in with her on things, but overall, we

ran the whole organization. We scheduled and ran all the events, tabling topics, ordered

goodies, did budgeting, and kept track of numbers, such as students we reached out to. I

guess I expected a little more supervision in general. But having a lot of responsibility also

helped me grow with my job and care to get engaged. I felt like the outcomes of events and

tabling numbers reflected on the work I put into it and how I promoted it, so I wanted to do

well and be an asset to the staff at the Wellness Center. Therefore, I would say that this

internship site can be a good opportunity for students that want to work in the health

education sector or in health promotion. I would recommend it to any student considering

health education or working with college students. I personally found myself being more

passionate about environmental health so I would not consider a career in this field. What I

also realized it how frustrating and draining it can be to try to promote health and raise
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awareness on alcohol and other drugs, but GCSU regularly plans events on campus in which

students are literally allowed to consume alcohol out on the street. It was just very eye-

opening that even though we try to promote health, our whole society is wired to where

money is more important than the health of the individual, hence it is very difficult to get

students to listen. I still enjoyed the setting of my site a lot, as it was a feeling of being part of

a team in which every member equally contributes, rather than a hierarchy in which my boss

tells me exactly what to do when. So overall, I would definitely love to work in an

environment like the one I experienced here, just not the same field.

Internship Preparedness

Academically, I felt very prepared for this internship, mainly because of the service-

learning hours from last semester, which introduced me to the work environment as well as

my duties. The work I performed during this semester was in opinion mainly not based on

knowledge, but more on finding valuable resources, getting a routine, and being creative. By

that, I mean that there already are multiple websites for college health promotion, and I just

needed to find them and filter the best information from them to give to students here.

Getting a routine implies that our weeks mostly looked the same, or at least very similar, and

we just had to adjust our material based on the health topic we were promoting each week.

Reading through my journals there is a clear pattern of how the beginning of the week was

always about finding and creating material and preparing for the week, the middle of the

week was tabling and delivering the information, and the end of the week was always a recap

and planning of the next week. By the end of the first few weeks, me and the other intern had

a perfect routine to get things done in time. We would only add to or change our routine if we

had events coming up or needed to get other things done, like the bulletin boards or the

mental health campaign posters on campus. Consequently, I wouldn’t even say that I didn’t

feel prepared in any area. I definitely improved some skills, for example being creative, but I
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didn’t learn anything completely new for me. The class I used the most was community

health. First of all, as I mentioned before, the service-learning hours helped me prepare

exactly for what I needed to do. I also think that the concept of cultural competency helped

me be open-minded and talk to students. I have become a good listener and was able to reach

out to students and give them information I found helpful for them based on what they told

me. For example, one student was talking about how stressed he was and how it puts a

burden on his mental health. I gave him mental health resources on campus and informed him

that GCSU offers 12 free counseling session to each student. Information like this needs to be

way more promoted as this is a great offer from the school to support their students. I don’t

think that I could have been better prepared for this internship by the school or the public

health program. As I mentioned, my internship was not based on factual knowledge learned

in class, but more on using good resources. I do think that GCSU does a good job at teaching

students how to find valuable resources and becoming an independent and responsible

individual. Through assignments that required different skills throughout my semesters as a

public health student and through the feedback I have received from professors, I gained the

confidence in my ability to handle all different kinds of tasks. I think professors in the School

of Health and Human Performance do a great job at teaching students to be confident and

independent, which is to me even more important than teaching us only factual knowledge.

Internship Performance*

For me personally the most important thing I have learned about myself is that I can

handle way more stress than I thought I could. The first week was super difficult and I

thought I was not going to be able to handle the internship plus all the other commitments

that I have. Throughout the whole semester, I was still not having an easy time juggling

everything, but I was for sure way better at it than I thought I would be, and I improved with

time. Another thing that I have learned is that I never used to be creative and into arts, but
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over the past couple of months, I found that small part inside of me that enjoys creating and

designing flyers, posters, social media posts, and making buttons. I personally feel like I have

excelled in communicating with others. Since many of our events are collaborations with

other organizations, we had to contact people and figure out which organization is

responsible for what part of the event. Although I believe that I can always improve on

everything, I already feel confident in my ability to reach out to others, even knowing that

they are way more experienced than me. One thing I still want to improve on is my ability to

listen and focus when there is a lot of information coming from another person. It is not that I

do not want to listen or think it is not important, but I think I need to prepare better, maybe

simply by having a paper and pen ready, to write down the information in order to not forget

them after a few minutes. I would rate the overall quality of my work as good. I am confident

in my ability to find resources and provide the found information to a third party in a fun and

attractive way. Throughout these past months I had to learn to take factual information and

put it in a way that students would want to learn about it and remember it. This is a skill that

can be applied to any situation in life. Another thing that will help me in my future is the

ability to take responsibility and independently work in an efficient manner. I have learned

about myself that I can be given tasks and complete those professionally, even if I feel

overwhelmed in the beginning. I am sure this will help me be successful in any career.

Personal/Professional Insights/Benefits

The internship has not impacted my professional and academic goals. As I mentioned

before, through my public health classes I have developed a big interest in environmental

science, which has not changed during these past couple of months. I also have experienced

how difficult it is to find the right methods to target the population and how frustrating it is as

our whole society, especially the college culture, teaches students the opposite of healthy

behaviors. I would not want to work in a job that frustrates me, even if I can impact a few
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students. My personal goals have only changed to the extent that I am more aware of what is

happening at colleges and that I have developed the utmost respect for any professional

working in the field and supporting students. I see personal growth because I have gotten

more confident, and I am proud to have opened myself to this opportunity. I believe that I am

privileged for any opportunity in life and even though, I do not want to continue the career

path I chose for the internship, I am taking a lot from it simply because it all adds to my

college and life experience. Regarding the organization, I experienced a great work

environment and very dedicated work towards the goal, which is to promote health on the

GCSU campus. Considering the small amount of funding and support the school provides to

the office, they have been doing an incredible job at supporting students. Providing resources

and giving out goodies can be small things that can impact a student’s health.