From Schoolroom to Workroom

Job Title and Responsibilities

I don’t believe that I have a specific job title at SEK-CAP. I do know that I am the technical writing intern who is working under Becky Gray, who is the Director of Research, Planning, and Grants Development.  

My responsibilities include running the Facebook page and completing any writing or editing that Becky sends my way. These writing and editing projects have been anything from making a questionnaire fit on a single sheet of paper to writing the complete Annual Report for the organization.

Qualifications

Some required qualifications for this position would be:

• ·         Being a senior in the technical writing department
• ·         Completed Document Design, or are in the process of it,
• ·         Completed Technical and Professional Writing
• ·         Learned to copyedit

Some preferred qualifications for this position would include:

• ·         An interest in non-profit
• ·         A real concern for the impoverished and those of low-income
• ·         Taken multiple graphic design courses

New Abilities and Skills

I have gained and practiced many new abilities during this internship. I have gained a second experience, and learned a completely different technique, running a social media website. The SEK-CAP page has a different kind of follower than the KSNOW page. They are less passionate, a little bit less involved, and make up a different demographic than the KSNOW page. Thus, they interact a lot less than the followers of KSNOW. Comments are fewer and farther inbetween, as are likes and other methods of interaction and feedback. Because of this, outreach is much smaller. Another ability I was able to practice was copywriting for business. Copywriting for school, where the resulting document was never read or implemented, is very different than writing for business, where the resulting document is read by hundreds of people you don’t know and has endless impact on policy and decision-making. In the same thread, I had practice editing large manuals and multiple pages. Another area I had practice in was document design, especially regarding multiple pages. However, this isn’t the loud, in-your-face kind of document design, but a more subtle design using only text and spacing. A brand new skill I had to develop was meeting with business people and working with them on projects. Specifically, I had to learn what their expectations were. In meetings, I had to learn to ask the right questions and speak respectively, formally, yet be very friendly, in order to fit into the expectations set in the workplace.

Some of the abilities and skills I thought I would learn/practice but have not include:

• ·         Going to the job site every day
• ·         Learning what a professional wardrobe looked like for my field
• ·         Meeting new people in business and building a professional network

If Wishes Were Horses 

I do wish I had the experience of going to the job site every day, so that I had to opportunity to learn what the atmosphere is like and what kinds of behavior are expected. Also, I wish I had this opportunity to make connections with other business people. Next, I am terrible with clothing. If I had to dress according to expectation, maybe the idea of dressing for the workplace would become less intimidating.  Finally, I very much wish I had to opportunity to learn how to meet people within the business setting and how to build a professional network.

Schoolroom to Workroom

The difference between writing and working for the internship and writing and working for school is that with school, the only person who suffers from a botched job is yourself. Your grade suffers, you don’t learn the lesson, and you feel a bit guilty. However, if you are late with an ‘assignment’ for the internship, or if you cannot give your full effort, then the consequences are much larger. Thus, the pressure to do a fantastic job is heavy and, at the beginning, can be frightening. Also different is that the world is affected by your writing. Rather than just your professor reading your writing or editing job, your work has real-world consequences. Your writing can save or harm a life. Another thing that is very different working within an internship than within school is that your work partners actually care about the work at hand. You are less likely to be stuck with a deadweight person in group projects because each person has a larger investment and personal pride and passion. 

Work Atmosphere

The atmospheres at both of the office buildings I have entered have seemed friendly and welcoming. All of the individuals I have met have been open, inviting, and eager to meet new people. I felt welcomed and important. I would assume that this atmosphere develops due to type of people a nonprofit organization attracts as employees. I doubt anyone or nearly anyone is there solely with the intent to make money; rather, they all have a vague idea of making the world a better place.

Power, Authority, Hierarchy

My power in this position increased only slightly. I began as a simple intern, willing to do any work handed to me. Partway through the internship, Becky gained respect for my knowledge of how to work social media. Because of this respect, my power increased marginally, but enough to be able to initiate projects and movements on social media without having to check with authority, first. Another place in which my power increased was gaining a respected voice and opinion on certain projects and actions. My opinion the projects I was given mattered more than I expected it to, considering I am only an intern. Susan Katz makes this point in her article “A Newcomer Gains Power.” I was considered an “expert” in social media, and “if an individual—even an individual who lacks power based on his or her position within the organizational space—is an expert rhetor in an organization where the rhetorical expertise is valued and needed (but is not the norm), that expertise may be the source of significant power” (Katz, 437). This rule has proven firmly true in my case because there is no one as knowledgeable about the techniques of social media within the circle Becky moves in; thus, she sees me as the ‘expert’ in the field. Therefore, she gives me power over the items I post to the Facebook page and over the techniques that I use to gain outreach.