In May of her sophomore year, Stephanie Kang (’11) looked ahead to her summer vacation and realized, “I need to do something!” Although she had usually worked retail jobs during the summer, Stephanie knew it was time to step it up and seek out an internship. Little did she know then that, by the end of the summer, she’d be shaking hands with her “boss,” Senator Diane Feinstein, after interning in the Senator’s Los Angeles office for twelve weeks.
After learning of the internship opportunity through the alumni director at her Los Angeles high school, Stephanie applied and interviewed for the position. By late May, though, she had already begun interning at a PR company when she got the call from the Senator’s intern coordinator.
“I was really excited but felt torn because I’d already committed to this other internship,” Stephanie explains. “I finally decided, though, that the senatorial internship was more in line with what I wanted to do in life, and I’d definitely regret turning it down.”
A double major in English and Legal Studies, Stephanie planned to go to law school after graduation but felt like a political neophyte. “I was really intimidated going into it,” she admits. “I figured all the other interns would know more about every issue.”
What she found, though, was welcoming young staffers who trained all the interns on answering phones, talking points for constituents, and writing staff memos. Although the tasks seemed daunting at first, within a week Stephanie had the hang of her responsibilities and soon became a regular assistant to the staff member who worked on transportation issues. Writing memos based on meetings and research was the tame part of the job; taking constituents’ phone calls was the wild part.
“We were always answering the phones,” Stephanie recalls, “and as the healthcare issue escalated, so did the calls. That’s why we would take them in shifts—dealing with getting yelled at was exhausting. We were trained to keep calls short, be respectful, and be professional. It definitely toughened me up.”
In addition to their duties, Senator Feinstein’s interns were exposed to a series of luncheon speakers who shared information about their career paths and advised the college students about other opportunities. Stephanie calls the summer “a huge learning experience,” one that confirmed her suspicion that politics was not her calling.
In fact, Scripps College Career Counselor Valinda Lee says that internships are a great way for students to learn about job qualities they do not enjoy. “What a fantastic chance to get exposure to a field you want to learn more about, with only a short-term commitment,” says Lee. “Then after the internship we can sit down with students and figure out what aspects they did or didn’t like and extrapolate to other jobs.”
Lee notes that, on average, a student will participate in 2 or 3 internships or experiential learning opportunities during her time at Scripps. Through its membership with the Nationwide Internship Consortium, Scripps offers students direct access to thousands of internship opportunities across the country—not just in the Los Angeles area.
While Stephanie’s experience led her away from politics, it did expose her to political issues she now understands better and, of course, it led to a face-to-face meeting and photo op with the Senator. Not bad for a summer vacation.