I have been given the opportunity not only to learn the language of marketing, but to learn it from a great bunch of folks who truly know their craft and who I will forever look up to in my future career in marketing and public relations.
My internship has met my learning goals. I have learned great new things. I have expanded my professional network. The time for me to move on has arrived. But just a week ago, I could not believe that once I am done with this learning adventure I will never get to walk through the door of the Cole Center where my internship took place for 16 long, but sweet weeks, and that I will never see the people I worked with, took my lunch break with and shared bunch of things from food recipes to professional dreams.
But now I am ready to move on and to take my internship learnings to a new level - a job, that is. And who knows - maybe some day I will come back to where I started - to the place where fun begins, as the motto of the Park District states.
And fun I had!
I will never forget the Zombie 5K special event and the fun and togetherness it brought to the community. Witnessing the huge amount of time and energy that went behind the scenes of this event's organization has been a priceless lesson for me of how work needs to be done. The marketing department has shown a remarkable professionalism and commitment to the community, boundless flexibility and willingness to improve its costumer services and marketing efforts on any given day with so little notice at times, but with a big determination to make it on time, to meet the deadline, to deliver to the community.
And the community has reflected its appreciation of the Park District services and programs through the thousands of surveys I have been updating Survey Monkey with for the last few months. Sure, there were some complains that the water in one of the pools in the Vaughan aquatics center has been a little chilly lately, but overall the surveys I went through have been full of appreciation and encouragement of the Park District.
With the Winter Activity Guide now finished, posted on the website, shared on Facebook and mailed to this same community, we have now started working on the Spring Activity Guide. It is a never ending process of writing, editing and proofreading of activity guides, brochures and social media content around here!
In addition to Survey Monkey, I had the opportunity to expand my knowledge of creating slideshow videos, to improve my writing skills using the Associated Press Style, to become an expert on Flickr and to hone my editing and proofreading abilities. Not to mention expanding my professional network and learning to speak the language of marketing and public relations. What more a marketing intern can ask for?
As for me - I am extremely happy and proud that for 16 weeks I have been a part of the marketing department of this great organization, and that I have helped as well.
I will forever treasure my experience as a marketing intern at the Fox Valley Park District, and I know that the great memories I have created here will last me for a lifetime.
And to make sure of this I asked one of the staff members to take a few pictures of me in the lobby of the Cole Center in Aurora where my internship took place.
Isn't this fire place just gorgeous? Seriously considering to personalize one of this pictures into my Christmas card for this year. Just kidding!
