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Experience is invaluable
July 17, 2007

Work experience is invaluable to students preparing for a career in any field.

As I promote the importance of student work experience, I thought it appropriate to share my own experiences and opinions and how the process has impacted my education.

I found my first co-op position through a Northeastern co-op database, which was full of companies who have partnered with the program before, but students aren’t limited to just what is readily available.

Some students can work with their advisors to contact companies to try to create their own positions. This may mean finding their own living arrangements and possibly roughing it as an unpaid intern, but it offers the chance to sculpt your own work experience with a company that offers what you’re interested in pursuing.

As a journalism major, I found a job in the sports department of a local newspaper, and I’m not sure I could have sculpted the fit any better. Despite requiring me to report to work every morning at 5 a.m., the position offered me the experience that only a small, local, understaffed newspaper could provide. I had the opportunity to work on almost every aspect of producing a daily newspaper, including reporting, editing, and designing pages.

In my opinion that is the place to start, in the smaller companies who will depend on you to do more than that big company you always dreamed of working for. It may seem like a dream-come-true, but the small companies are the ones that need you as much as you need them. 

I found myself able to apply much of what I had already learned in my first three semesters in the classroom, to real-world projects. Being the junior member of a well-experienced staff may leave you feeling out of the loop, but that’s why you’re there, to learn what it is really like to be a journalist, or an engineer, or whatever you think you want to be. 

And that might even end up being the most important lesson you learn after six months or a summer of experience—that you don’t want to be what you thought, because it’s not as it seems on paper or from afar— and that’s why you’re an intern. That experience will dictate the course of your education and the rest of your professional life, and that is exactly what makes it invaluable.

Posted by Jessica MacNeil on July 17, 2007 | Comments (0)