Throughout my time with the Penn State football team over the summer, it was really neat getting to see the ins and outs of how an elite athletic program runs. There were definitely aspects of the internship that weren’t what I expected them to be, but I’m thankful for the experience. In the office, I did a lot of administrative and operational work such as gathering data into spreadsheets for coaches. It was very project based, and I found that I enjoy this work style a lot. I learned that by breaking large projects into smaller ones I could motivate myself to work a lot better.

My favorite part of the internship was getting to work the football camps that high school prospects would attend. In all, there were seven camps that I had the opportunity to work. I typically helped out with registration at the beginning, and then would transition into a supportive role where I’d run information to coaches, and help input all of the data from the drills into our database. It was refreshing being able to work more with other players and to get out of the office for a bit. Personally, I feel like I learned a lot about myself and what types of work I excel at and what areas I struggle with. I’ve already been able to translate and apply this in my professional development. I had an internship interview yesterday and was able to take the concepts and experience I gained from the summer and talk about them to my interviewer.

All in all, it was awesome getting to directly translate my love and passion for athletics into a professional setting. I’m very grateful for the opportunity and everything I learned during my internship.