Throughout much of this internship, I have been learning as I go. Never before have I studied economic development, obesity reduction, grant writing, or marketing; yet, I have worked on or am working on projects dealing in all of those subject areas. I am beginning to wonder if this is what the workforce will be like— and whether my education will fully prepare me for what a job will require. I am not so naïve as to think that the answer is yes, or there would not be such things as internships and value in experience. I know that I am now gaining the experience to complement my education. I am also seeing some overlap between the two, most recently in the project on which I am currently working. I have found a project that can incorporate the knowledge I have gained in the classroom and put it to a practical and transformative use.
For the current project, we are writing a grant for the Knight Foundation’s Community Information Challenge. In proving the need for this competition, Knight’s CEO very explicitly explained the challenge that communities face: “For the first time in the history of the Republic, it’s easier for a high school student to learn about the crisis in Darfur online than corruption in local government in the local media.” That statement has truly impacted the way that we have approached this project, but it has also complicated efforts. The project seeks innovative uses for technology to aid in the dissemination of local information, which is an understandable goal given the technological age in which we live. However, it is hard to develop and propose a plan involving technology for an area whose citizens cannot all access the internet. This became our own personal challenge to overcome in the project: do we develop what we think is a great proposal but may not actually engage all citizens, or do we do what would best meet the citizens’ needs, even though it might not make such a worthy grant proposal? Our solution came by a simple fusion of a medium that people were accustomed to, the television, and one we hope they will adapt to, a website. By melding the two, citizens will hopefully be exposed to and eventually transition to the website. To aid in that transition, part of our grant proposal will include site navigation education at local libraries, community centers, and senior centers.
Utilizing my knowledge of civic engagement became a way for me to connect the academic field stressed in my internship application to the work completed during my internship. My knowledge of case studies and tools of engagement became a foundation to devise exactly how the Dan River regions citizens could be engaged. After much thought and study of other models, we decided to propose an incorporation of online citizen forums to foster discussion about issues relevant to the city. Initially, though, citizens would be informed through television programming and online blog articles by citizens and elected officials. After an understanding of the issue was developed, they would engage in productive, positive discussion via the online forums with the goal of creating a solution to the issue at hand. Without even realizing it, we had formulated a plan to cultivate civic engagement within our proposal. It is not the explicit goal of the project, but we found a way to incorporate it into our plan to educate citizens on local issues. We believe that merely telling people about the issues and events is not enough; we must involve them in generating solutions to challenges and support for work already progressing.
So, in a roundabout way, I found myself bridging the gap between the classroom and the office last week. With that, the importance of learning outside of as well as inside of the classroom became more apparent than ever to me.
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