by Angie Arrant
School counselor Lindsay Collins said that internships, which are unpaid positions, are beneficial.
“The impact of internships on high school students is that they have experience in a field that they might be interested in, and it leads to resources, resume building and college applications,” Mrs. Collins said. “It really helps solidify if that field is what they want to do.”
Maya Burton, a senior in the Center for Communications and Media Relations, completed internships during the past two summers. In 2014, she worked for Bell Tower Pictures as a personal assistant shooting the movie “The Prodigal.” Her job primarily was to set up.
While interning at Bell Tower Pictures, Maya met Heather Waters, the producer of “The Prodigal.” Ms. Waters emailed Maya to participate with the volunteer core team at the Virginia International Film Festival.
“So I applied,” Maya said. “I did my first cover letter, updated my resume and emailed it back to her, and she ended up being happy with it.”
Maya said that her updated resume helped others understand her capabilities.
“I had to do some InDesign work because she needed some help making fliers, and since I put it on my resume that I had experience with InDesign, it really made her happy,” Maya said.
Mrs. Collins said that building relationships during an internship is valuable.
“Hopefully, it is a symbiotic relationship where they are helping you and you are helping them. It’s about building that relationship. It’s about how do I do this? How do I excel at customer service?” Mrs. Collins said.
Students usually choose a paycheck over an internship.
“Do not shy away from internships that do not pay money because even though I didn’t get paid on all of the stuff I did, I was able to network and excel to other things and bridge off to other internships,” Maya said.
Summer jobs provide a paycheck and may extend to employment during the school year.
“If you go to school around the area, you can continue to work even if you go away to college because you can always see if you can come back and work during the summer or during breaks,” Mrs. Collins said.
Abram Waller, Class of 2016, works as the drive-through director and certified trainer for Chick-fil-A. Abram first worked for Chick-fil-A when he was a high school sophomore.
“It was hard to balance friendships and work over the summer, but I made friends at work as well. And I think that workplace friendships are beneficial because those people are your teammates and not just your co-workers. If you can unite with the people around you to get a common goal done, you’ll most likely get the results you are looking for,” Abram said.
Christine Pedersen, Economics and Personal Finance teacher, said that understanding real world finances is essential when getting a job.
“It is so important for students to understand a W-4 before filling it out,” Mrs. Pedersen said. “When filling out a W-4, most students should claim that they are dependents.”
Mrs. Pedersen also said that students should understand the difference between net and gross income.
“They should first be aware that they will get less in their paycheck than what they think because of the taxes being taken out. Also, ideally students should save ten percent of their money out of their gross and not net because gross is what you should have before taxes are taken out,” Mrs. Pedersen said.
Both jobs and internships offer experience.
“The number one pro for jobs and internships is getting the experience and learning if that particular field is what you want to do,” Mrs. Collins said.
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