Hometown: Dexter, MI
Major and class standing: English, Junior
Where you interned: The Sun Times News, Dexter, MI

What was your internship title and role/responsibilities?
For my editorial writing internship at The Sun Times, I was responsible for receiving and posting obituaries, press releases, and public notices online on our website, as well as formatting and submitting them for physical prints each week. I also was assigned a variety of articles to write each week, which potentially included interviews with people. In addition to posting and writing articles, I also proof-read the draft of three separate printed papers to look for errors.

How did you obtain your internship? What resources did you utilize to secure your internship?
I first knew about this internship locally, as it’s a local newspaper, and my family was previously subscribed to it. After looking into it, I called the business and initially left a voicemail expressing my interest in interning there. After I got a call back, I talked to Chuck, the owner, about logistics and we scheduled a time to meet in-person for an interview. When we met, we talked about what an internship would look like and the potential roles I would fill, as well as get to know each other. As it turns out, not only is he an alum of MSU who majored in English, but I graduated high school with his daughter, so those connections helped. I used resources from AL 260 that I took to not only create a good resume but also to prepare for the interview.

What did your daily routine include?
Each day, I was sent press releases, public notices, and obituaries from either Doug, the editor, Chuck, or directly from people/clerks. I then formatted these to post on our website through WordPress with Microsoft Word and sent confirmation to the sender. I then took those and formatted them into a folder, which I submitted to a dropbox at the end of the week. As for my articles, if I were assigned to one, I would reach out to the potential interviewee and attempt to set up a time to meet and a location. I would then meet them and conduct an interview for our article and proceed to write it that night. Sometimes I sent it to Doug to look over first, but he sometimes had me post it without looking over it, as he trusted my capabilities. Each Tuesday, we had an office meeting in-person where the writers and editors would meet and discuss the current articles we’re working on, as well as assign new ones. We also discussed how to improve our plans and articles, bouncing ideas off one-another. Each Saturday morning I would submit my folder of all my work done that week into a dropbox in order for it to be ready to print the following week. Each Monday, Chuck sent out a draft of that week’s papers and had us look it over for errors.

What was your least favorite part of the internship?
My least favorite part of the internship would be how inconsistent it could be. Some weeks, there was an overflow of work to be done because people sent in so many press releases, public notices, and obituaries, but then other weeks were potentially very slow, as there wasn’t much content coming in.

What skills did you learn and/or build upon during your internship?
I built upon many skills, as well as acquired new ones, both hard and soft. One of the most important skills I learned was how to operate and navigate WordPress. Not only was that helpful for this internship, but I feel like that will be very helpful in my future. Another skill that I built upon was my capability to conduct interviews. Given that I did many, I felt like I improved my efficiency of asking questions without stuttering, as well as learning which questions are important to ask. I felt like I was less nervous toward the end of my internship. I also improved my workplace communication, especially when there was something I didn’t understand.

What did you learn about the industry or your career path as a result of the internship? What are your future plans?
Something I learned about the industry was how unstable journalism can be. It could just be that it’s a smaller newspaper business, but it felt very shaky at times, and I think Covid plays a big factor in that, as many formats are shifting over to digital rather than print. Another thing that I didn’t necessarily learn but that the internship reinforced is my desire to not pursue a job in journalism. Before taking this role, I had a decent idea that I’d rather go into something on the more creative side of English, such as publishing, but after experiencing this, I feel more confident in my decision.