I did and I didn’t have expectations about my internship. I didn’t know what I would be doing, but I expected that I would be able to contribute something new and I would be needed. When I arrived, the executive director was still in East Asia, and the summer coordinator bumming around Brazil, so I was left in the hands of the only other employee who was doing absolutely everything for the organization. She was really excited for me to be working with her, but my helpfulness to the organization wasn’t as much as I’d thought and I got frustrated feeling like one of any of their other volunteers. Wasn’t I an intern? I was asked to make thank-you cards, print posters, attend events, and put stickers on condoms. I didn’t feel like I was doing anything special.
When the rest of the staff got back I started spending more hours in the office, and always the eager beaver, I constantly offered my self for anything. I started going to staff meetings and was given the organization’s biggest summer fundraiser to help organize. I asked lots of questions, went to a Sex Ed workshop at the high school with the summer coordinator and tried to brush up on my knowledge of STI’s, HIV, and sexual health.
Halfway through the summer, the sexual health and harm reduction coordinator had to leave her position, and the director offered it to me! I jumped at the chance to become even more involved in the organization and have a paid internship. I thought my role and responsibilities would change, and they did slightly in that I had to get things done and spend 15 hours a week working for the office, but with only a couple months left, there wasn’t much point in fully training me for a job that would soon have to be re-filled. That, I realized, was the reality, but by this time I had also realized that I was there to do whatever it was they needed so they could do their jobs better or have more time. So I rolled coins from our donation tins, and put stickers on condoms, and wrote up tax receipts. And they couldn’t have appreciated it more.