03 Sep Not Just Getting Coffee: My First Internship Helped Me Find My Purpose

Interning at Contra Costa College’s student-run Advocate, the author (not pictured) realized she had an affinity for interviewing and, she writes, “that I could pursue a career where I’d be able to do something I loved and use it to hopefully help people too.” (Photo by Wiktoria Skrzekotowska on Unsplash)

Commentary, Juliana Libunao

I never expected that something I just wanted to get over with would end up answering almost every question I had about my future.

I still remember attending my school’s orientation, reading over the list of graduation requirements, willing myself to understand what exactly one of the points was asking: “Every student will need to complete a total of two internships – 50 hours each.”

An internship? The only knowledge I had of them at the time were those unpaid intern characters I had seen in movies — always being asked to grab coffee and answer emails. Is that really what they wanted us to do? What other kinds of internships were there? Would anyone even want a high school student working for them?

Questions began to swirl through my head like an endless whirlpool of confusion, and I was left spiraling. So much so, I had spent my whole first year and a half of high school doing nothing more than researching possible internship opportunities instead of actually applying to any of them.

By the time my sophomore year had reached its halfway point, my focus had finally been set on getting an internship. Fortunately, as a Middle College High School student, not only do I receive credit from Contra Costa College, I also could apply to any ones open there. After finding a list of on-campus internships on my school’s website, I decided it was better to just choose one and be done with it.

I was prepared to just close my eyes and blindly pick a department when I noticed one of the newly added opportunities at the very bottom of the list: a journalism internship.

There wasn’t much of a description as to what the position entailed, but that didn’t matter to me; I emailed them in the same sitting. Writing has always been something I enjoyed doing so, for once, I didn’t see any reason to hesitate.

That’s how I ended up with my first job: working as an intern for CCC’s student-run newspaper, The Advocate.

Getting proper work experience was as exciting as it was nerve-wracking. I was being treated as another member of the Advocate staff, and while it was really cool being able to learn about what went on behind the scenes of a news outlet, I was really nervous when it came to putting all that knowledge into practice and finally writing an article myself.

My first story, with The Advocate and in general, was about teachers in the West Contra Costa Unified School District campaigning for better learning environments. I’ve been a student in that district since elementary school, and so this topic, in particular, meant a lot to me. I knew that it deserved to be shared, and if I could be the one to do it, even better.

The article was more or less focused on what educators wanted from the district, and with that theme in mind, I got the chance to interview a lot of people for it. I had never conducted a proper interview before, but it quickly became my favorite part of the process.

I’ve always been told I have a naturally curious personality. I really enjoyed getting to ask all of the questions that I had and felt like I was coming out with a new perspective after each interview. After learning more about all of my sources’ viewpoints, it really helped motivate me to write and make sure that I produced something that did their cause justice.

I spent about a month working on it from start to finish. Figuring out how to manage writing a news article for the first time while also making sure I was getting everything done for school was more of a challenge for me than I expected. It involved a lot of multitasking and dedicating any of the breaks I was given to work on my story — tiring, yes, but more than fulfilling enough to make up for it.

Once my story had been published, some of my past teachers — who were part of the group of educators working towards higher educational standards — expressed how proud of me they were. It made me feel like I had done something good with the platform I was given.

It also did a lot in proving to me just how important the news is. It doesn’t matter how you’re getting the word out or in what capacity — just the fact that you’re providing information to the public matters. Even if what I covered was an issue going on only in my immediate community, I still felt like I was doing something important by reporting on it.

I knew I wanted to keep that feeling going for as long as possible. Despite only spending a few months interning at The Advocate, I realized that I could pursue a career where I’d be able to do something I loved and use it to hopefully help people too.

Before that internship, I had no clear vision for my future. Any career plan I had come up with felt temporary. But this was different. This felt real. And for the first time, I had something solid to chase.