Talk to someone with any major besides one within the school of communications, and tell them that you’re interning and taking a full course load, they might look at you like you’re insane, and for good reason. Interning during the semester and taking classes can be stressful and just plain overwhelming, but it’s absolutely manageable.
One of the best ways to ensure academic success while interning three days a week is to make the most of any time you have. Public transportation becomes your best friend. Getting into the city from Hofstra entails a bus ride, a train ride and maybe even a subway ride. Using that time to get reading done, though far less attractive than putting headphones in and zoning out for an hour or two, is a necessity.
Your planner will become your other BFF during your internship. Staying organized is the other key to success. Stay on top of your schedule. Know what assignments are due, know your deadlines. As college students, we’re involved in clubs, sports, and all kinds of activities. Through participating in the professional word a few days a week into the mix and your head is likely to start spinning, so give yourself a bit of structure and keep a meticulously detailed planner.
Besides the academic challenges, there are the miniscule trivialities that I find myself obsessing over. Like food. To bring lunch with me, or not to bring lunch with me, that is the questions I find myself struggling with every week. My internship only has me in the office for five hours a day, from 11:00 – 4:00. They say I can take a half hour for lunch, but getting in and then leaving an hour or so later just feels wrong to me.
So every day I bring in a hummus cup and pretzels to eat at my desk, and it’s been fine, it works, but I’m getting tired of them. I need to find another small lunch item I can bring with me to tide me over until the end of my day, because as much as I love a good New York City deli, eating “out” three times a week isn’t an option.
I am also the type of person to obsess over appropriate outfits for interning. There is no set dress code at my internship, and everyone the office doesn’t have a consistent feel to what everyone wears. Some people wear jeans on the daily, and others never wear them. On my first day, I walked in and I swear someone was wearing an old concert T. Rather playing it safe than sorry I’ve stuck to dresses, slacks, and blouses, but every once in a while a girl just wants to wear jeans on Friday.
As much as juggling my internship and classes can stress me out, there is still nothing I like to brag about more than the work I do there. I feel like all I do is talk about my internship, to anyone who will listen. Every day is something new, and every week I get more and more responsibility, and I couldn’t be more excited about it. As much as we like to complain about the cost of train tickets and the hours it takes to get to and from the city, I’m still grateful that Hofstra makes us intern, because as a senior, what better way of knowing if I’m ready to take on the real world than to throw me straight in a few times a week.