Internship Location: Madison, WI
Organization Type: State Government
Policy Areas: Legislative
This past semester, I had the opportunity to intern with Wisconsin State Senator Joan Ballweg of Wisconsin’s 14th Senate District. This experience was invaluable and taught me so many different skills. My internship initially began with typical office work, including constituent outreach, office organization, and attending legislative events. Then, I was given a chance to further my intern responsibilities when the Communications Advisor moved on to a new position. In the interim of the new Communications Advisor settling in, I was able to engage in senior staff communications, such as sending e-newsletters, drafting co-sponsorship memos, writing articles on behalf of Senator Ballweg, and conducting policy research. While expanding my responsibilities was challenging, it made my internship much more rewarding. From this internship, I took away two key lessons. The first is adaptability. There are very few moments in life that will go exactly as planned. Although I didn’t expect to take on a communications role, my ability to adapt to this change allowed me to succeed. As the famous proverb goes, when life gives you lemons, make some lemonade. The second and most important lesson I learned in this internship is that “no” is not the end-all-be-all. While searching for an internship position, I came across many rejections and “no’s,” which did deter my hope of finding a role for the semester and hopefully graduating with the public policy certificate. However, when I finally got this position, I was so excited; all the rejections I had received seemed to build to that moment. Further, the office and I faced many “no’s” in the internship itself. Yet, we all worked together to push through every day to achieve our goals and did not let any rejections stop us from doing so.