My Job Talk

As a full time high school student I had never worked a day in my life. When internships rolled around I didn’t really know what to expect. Internships ran differently from last year so I couldn’t really ask the seniors how their internships had gone. They had just gone twice a week for an afternoon, but I was just about to be thrown headfirst into a three week full immersion.

Even on the first day I was struck by the easy work pace. Even though my internship site was a non-profit museum I had imagined a sprint. With fast paced America being what it is. Instead, it was not a sprint but a saunter. There was a destination, but not that much of a rush to get there. On the first day my mentor gave us the rundown on the computers we would be using and went to his office. I sat down to work and expected to feel a predatory gaze on my back but it never came. I had expected my mentor to be constantly hovering to make sure that we did nothing wrong, but he didn’t. When lunchtime rolled around all we had to do was tell him we were going to lunch. He didn’t ask where and we didn’t need a permission slip or a note. I could go to the bathroom without having to ask. I could walk around without anybody having to know where I’d be going, where I would be later or why I was there. Nobody was asking me to justify where I was going or what I was doing.

This sense of freedom at my internship was a joyous break from everything else. School regulations evaporated like the morning mist in the sun. I realized that the workplace was nothing like school. I had thought it would be like school - straight laced, a set lunch time, breaks in between structured periods...Everything inside me said that it was going to be just like school. They were going to be teachers and not mentors - assigning homework, maybe making us put up our chairs at the end of the day or when we left...These things seem perfectly normal in a school environment but they don’t really apply to a workplace. I realized that almost the first day. Going through my first day in a sort of haze of bewilderment, it took me awhile to get used to this change. There is a gate in front of the museum that doesn’t open till 9am. I didn’t know that volunteers, that’s what I was, could go freely through the gate. I would wait outside until someone working for the museum walked up and opened the gate for me because I thought that I was not authorized to enter the gate by myself. It was not until the last week that I finally started letting myself in and breaking away from the “I’m going to get in trouble” thoughts. In school you can’t do that. You have to ask permission, otherwise there are consequences. At internships, mentors leave you on your own for the most part and you have to find your own way. The workplace has a very different atmosphere.

The sense of freedom was something that I had never really gotten before. Most of my life, as like other teens, I’ve been in school. It’s Monday through Friday, no breaks except for the occasional staff day. Teachers are always watching you because they’re responsible for you. With my internship I could go somewhere and no one would send me back to the library. This freedom just felt good. There was a spontaneity. It was nice to just leave for lunch and not have to stay on campus. It was nice for people to look at me as a co-worker instead of a student. It was nice to be on my own.

The rules and more rules at school and at home didn’t apply to me at internship. I was seen as a responsible adult and not as an impulsive young person. I understand that the school has to take care of us, but sometimes the rules upon rules and homework and schoolwork just pile up on you until you feel like you can’t move. Internship was a chance to relax. This newfound freedom really allowed me to enjoy my internship and showed me that the world is much bigger than I think it is.