Kirsten Buchanan

KINS 4306

Professor Kaninjing

July 2022

Internship Reflection Paper

Introduction

Over the course of Summer 2022, and for the completion of my undergraduate degree at

Georgia College, I have been interning at King’s Bridge Retirement Community in Atlanta, GA.

King’s Bridge is a geriatric living community where one can ‘age in place’ with the freedom of

independent living (IL) as well as the support of assisted living (AL) and memory care (MC) if

needed. King’s Bridge staff consists of a director board, one in which my supervisor is on, as

well as a supportive team under each director. These teams consist of certified nursing assistants

(CNAs), waiters/waitresses and chefs, technology experts, and more. My director’s current title

is the Director of Life Enrichment, meaning she is head of all activities as well as maintaining

residential satisfaction throughout their time at King’s Bridge.

Description of Experiences

In relation to my role at Kings Bridge, I worked mainly in activities and occasionally

would help, when necessary, in the wellness center. Before I began my internship, I came in for a

shadow day to get a feel of the place and the things I would be doing. That allowed me to feel

comfortable with where I was at and who I would be working with while also getting to meet a

few residents before I started. At the beginning of my first week, I assisted my coworkers with

activities, yet did not take the lead as I wanted to observe them to ensure that when I began to

lead/run activities, that I would be doing it correctly. As the week progressed, I began
leading/doing things on my own, in both MC and AL. I learned things quickly and began to feel

very comfortable in my environment and confident with the tasks I was doing.

The activities staff as a whole is always planning for what’s next. There are monthly,

weekly, and daily calendars for residents. There are also separate calendars for independent

residents, assisted living residents, and memory care residents, as activities can differ based upon

one’s mental and physical abilities. I helped come up with multiple activity ideas that I thought

the residents might enjoy that we then added to the monthly calendars. I also helped make,

design, and print a lot of the daily calendars for the residents on the assisted living floor, as they

are the only residents who receive daily calendars. We try to advertise and make sure the

residents always know what is going on, where it will be in the building, and what time it will be

at. There are also signs in the mailroom that I change daily that show all of the activities going

on that day (for the IL residents), as well as signs outside my supervisor, Edde’s, office when

there is entertainment. In terms of the staff for each activity, my supervisor would send out a

schedule every night saying who is supposed to be doing which activities for the following day.

It would state what the activity was, what time it would be at, and which group of residents it

would be with (IL, AL, or MC). I spent most of my time at King’s Bridge doing activities on the

AL and MC floors, as those residents need more assistance and guidance with things compared

to the independent residents who can do more things on their own. Every morning consists of

exercise. IL exercise begins at 9am on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday and 10am on Tuesday

and Thursday. AL exercise begins at 10:30am everyday, and MC exercise starts at 11am.

Exercise would also be different every day as Monday and Friday is exercise with balls, Tuesday

is exercise with weights, Wednesday is exercise with balloons, and Thursday is exercise with

bean bags. Edde would also normally alternate me every other day to every other week on which
floor I began my day on, conditional to where she would need me. Depending on the day, after

exercise on AL and MC, there would either be games (crosswords or other word/mind games),

trivia, Family Feud, manicures, bingo, Bible study, or a music therapist would come until it was

time for the residents to go to lunch. Lunch began at noon every day, and I would assist the

residents who needed help getting to lunch. My lunch began around 12:30pm everyday and

lasted until about 1:30pm. The first few weeks of my internship, my lunches were very busy as I

had meetings with those on the director board and with the activities staff. We would always

have our activities staff meeting on Wednesdays because that would be when everyone was

working. (Now, one of my coworkers resigned, one is retiring, and one changed departments, so

now we meet whenever we can.) As my internship has progressed and I have taken on more

responsibilities at King’s Bridge, I take my lunch “to-go” most days and eat in the activities

office while either working on my project of resident directories (& now also emergency

contacts), meeting with other staff, meeting with my supervisor, or planning future activities.

Needless to say, I always make myself busy with things to do so I feel as though my time at my

internship is spent well and productive. After lunch everyday, there are a variety of activities for

residents to attend which lead up to dinner time, and even a few activities after dinner. For

example, there is adult coloring and other arts and crafts, musical entertainment (at least twice a

week), game days for AL and MC and game nights for IL, themed parties on Wednesdays, IL

bingo, etc. Since these activities are all pre-planned, I will gather the supplies that I need and go

to where I need to be to host the activity and assist residents when needed.

Since I worked overtime almost every day, I would stay later than 5pm and keep myself

busy running errands around the building that my supervisor needed me to do, making daily

sheets for the following day, or working on my project of organizing and maintaining the
currency of the resident directories. I began this project within the first week of my internship. It

is somewhat of an ongoing project as they are updated frequently due to the arrival of new

residents at King’s Bridge as well as the passing of others. When residents move rooms or when

their birthday or phone number is wrong, I have to change them. After working on these books

for so long, I began to memorize the alphabetical order of all of the residents in the directory. I

also began to memorize their room numbers which has been very convenient for other tasks I do

around King’s Bridge. This project has also helped me get to know residents before meeting

them and be able to recognize them in the hallways and introduce myself. More recently, my

supervisor added to my project by asking me to organize/find all AL and MC residents’

emergency contacts. Both of these tasks are tedious but mean so much to my supervisor as I was

able to take this load off of her plate since it has been something she has been wanting to get

done for a while, yet just has not had the time to do it.

With regard to my time spent helping in the wellness center, I assisted the wellness

director and staff with organizing the wellness closet with many of the extra take-home COVID

tests and adult diapers. I also became very close with the many CNAs on staff at King’s Bridge

and would watch as they assist the residents as that is something else that would lead me towards

my future of becoming a nurse.

When I first started my internship, I had contrasting feelings. I was upset that I was

jumping straight into a job after graduation alongside the fact that I was going to be putting in so

many hours without getting paid. On the other hand, I was excited to be able to experience

something new and something that I had never done before as well as being able to take away

skills and assets learned at King’s Bridge for my future endeavors. I enjoyed every aspect of my

internship, yet the most rewarding aspect was being able to form connections with the residents,
listen to them tell stories about their past and their children, and watching their faces light up

during activities and other events around King’s Bridge.

Perception and Evaluation of the Internship

My internship at King’s Bridge definitely exceeded my expectations. I did not really

know what to expect before I started and I thought I would get bored quickly. I was very wrong.

The residents and staff at King’s Bridge are what made my experience as amazing as it was. I

felt valued at King’s Bridge and felt as though the work I was doing was really leaving an impact

on the residents and staff. King’s Bridge, more specifically the activities staff, were open to all of

my ideas and additions I wanted to incorporate. We all worked extremely well together for the

satisfaction of the residents. My supervisor did not have to hold my hand through every thing as I

picked up on things very quickly, learned to adapt to change, and go with the flow. She has

stated to me that she loves how I will always find something to do and how adaptable I have

been with recent changes of staff during my time at King’s Bridge. I liked how she did not hover

over me and could trust my abilities in the things I was doing, and she stated that she has enjoyed

having someone like me who has been very proactive. I have not only learned how to do my job,

but also how to interact with the geriatric community, how to properly care for them mentally

and physically, how to react when they may forget what is going on or who the people are that

surround them, how to make them feel comfortable at all times, etc. I have learned a lot from my

supervisor and other coworkers regarding my job, as well as just life skills in general, and I am

grateful to be able to have had this experience.

I have enjoyed my time at King’s Bridge so much that I have accepted a job offer on their

activities staff. We have agreed that I will begin working full-time on activities while

simultaneously working towards getting my CNA license. Once I have my CNA license, I will
transition to working part-time in activities and part-time in the wellness center (and on the

assisted living and memory care floors). I am excited for what is to come and I would definitely

recommend this site, or simply working in a retirement center, to any public health major!

Internship Preparedness

I feel as though I was prepared academically for my internship. Although as public health

majors, we had to take a community health class where we got hours for doing volunteer work

that was public health related, I feel as though that class could have done better in preparing us

for our internship. I did my hours with Health Movement, which I loved doing, and even finished

out the school year in the organization; but, I think that if there was a way for the community

health class to incorporate more hands on public health work (like our internship has) then public

health students would be even more prepared and ready for the weight of a 450 hour plus

internship.

I think that community health, a few of my psychology classes, and methods of health

promotion have prepared me the most for my internship at King’s Bridge. These classes helped

prepare me by allowing me to gain service hours in my collegiate career before beginning my

internship, as well as learning how individuals of a certain age react, learn, and adapt to things

going on around them as well as how the aging process affects them. I have also learned how to

promote certain health material and have observed and assisted on how that is done at King’s

Bridge. I feel as though the professors within Georgia College’s School of Health and Human

Performance can better express the things they have done first hand in relation to public health.

A handful of professors do and it is extremely beneficial to know how things work in the ’real

world’ relating to our major before going and figuring everything out yourself.
Internship Performance

As I stated previously, I feel as though I have gained a lot from my internship along with

new skills that I can continue using at King’s Bridge and throughout my future. I was very

satisfied by my performance at my internship, and I feel as though my supervisor was too. Being

able to receive a job offer from King’s Bridge exemplifies to me that my work was meaningful

and that my presence is necessary for the success of the retirement home. I feel as though I

gained time management skills and really pushed my body into continuing to do my best even

when I did not want to. I surprised myself with my drive for my job and I am very pleased with

the outcome. It has shown me a glance of how successful my future can be with a public health

degree. I just need to learn to have as much trust and faith in myself as the people around me do

and I will be even better!

Personal/Professional Insights/Benefits

As I stated previously, I have gained a lot from my time at King’s Bridge and it has

impacted my life a lot and will continue to as this will be my first job after graduation. This

internship has grown my confidence in my skills significantly and I can’t wait to see my personal

growth at King’s Bridge continue after I get my CNA license. I have learned that I do indeed like

working in the geriatric community. I am not sure if that will be a forever thing, but it is good in

my life as of now. I believe that might change after getting my CNA license as I may want to

pursue my career elsewhere with a different target population either continuing in the public

health realm or going back to school for nursing. It is scary yet exciting not knowing what is to

come in the long run, but as of right now, I am completing my undergraduate degree and I have a

job!