Communications Internship Insights 1

Communications Internship Insights

COMM 495: Communications Internship

At Public Access Channel 14

Summer 2021
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“What can be learned from an internship?” Many people may ask this question but as

someone who spent the last three months working at the local Public Access Channel as an intern

there is a lot to be gained through the experience. With any profession hands-on professional

experience however, I believe it is especially beneficial for people in the field of

communications and media production. My particular internship I was working heavily with

Television production and specifically post-production. I learned many things throughout my

time with this organization that I believe with be highly useful when I enter the workforce after

graduation. I will be discussing all these things that I learned through this process that I believe

will help me in my future career. Not only these highly useful things were gained but also

somethings came to my attention throughout.

Through this particular internship I did various things and even just assisted with various

things. Early on I helped set up and film a program called “One on One” during which I worked

the switch board for some of the time under supervision of my supervisor. I also immediately

was given some footage to edit together as a promotional video about the community center

reopening. The next big thing I tackled was a program called “Hometown Heroes.” For this I not

only assisted with the filming of this show which was done at Wicomico High School but was

then given the responsibility to edit the footage for that together. This was a much bigger task

than anything I had done yet but worth the challenge since this was a regular program on the

channel. Once this was finished and being run on the channel, I moved on the some work with a

non-profit organization. For this I chose to reach out to an organization I spent many years a part

of and probably got my interest in media arts. I reached out to someone at from the local chapter

of 4-H and agreed to do some small promos. I would up doing eight small promos that can be run

both on PAC14 something for the organization to have on their social medias. Lastly the other
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intern and I worked together on a short film to submit for an event. I wanted to submit the best

work possible and put my most professional foot forward in doing this project. We worked

together having split up some of the individual tasks that would need to be done. It was

interesting to work on something that wouldn’t be run on the channel. To coordinate with

another person for an end goal of a short film with someone else who may have other ideas of

how it should be and how things should be done.

Each of those things I worked and helped with throughout the time I believe taught me a

great deal about the business of television production. Of course, daily practices are often

dependent on the organization but having these three months of experience in such an

environment was an invaluable experience for me. I understand every place is different but

having experience in one environment will lend skills in a different environment that otherwise I

may not have to offer. This is why some people like to have a wide range of experiences so they

can bring more to the table for future employers and co-workers who may have to depend on me

as a competent professional.

Although I have been studying communications for a number of years now however there

is always more to learn on any subject. One major thing I learned in my time with PAC14 is that

television is such a wide range of tasks. It involved a lot of teamwork at times. For most people

when you think of television production it is not usually a whole lot of people working together

and it doesn’t always have to be this way but often times it involves well-coordinated teamwork

to get the job done right. Also, coordinating with local businesses is a skill that needs to be

utilized in this type of work environment.

Although there is a lot of teamwork involved in television production as I personally

witnessed there is a lot of independency as well. This is a strange combination but within one
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project there might be amazingly coordinated teamwork as well as independent work. Some

projects for example will be filmed in a teamwork effort but then will be given to an individual

to edit. While it is hard to explain how something could be made of teamwork and independence

it does happen. This part of the internship surprised me as well as how some programs are just

handled by an individual or a very small group from beginning to end.

This internship has definitely made me more confident I chose the right career path for

me personally. I believe being in an office setting where I am doing the very work I’ve been

striving to learn about all these years felt like a true test of whether I made the correct decision or

not. I believe it was not only worth the time, but I can’t think of a better profession for me now.

It seems like this time where I was an employee for a television station helped me realize that I

am not only capable but also really enjoy the work itself. This experience could have easily

shown me that I did not want to work in television production but instead I firmly believe it

made my passion for the work even stronger and confirmed not only my decision but my years

of hard work that prepared me for this time in my life. Not only did I feel more capable the more

I worked and the more things I worked on got played on-air, but I realized more and more that I

could not do this type of work but really want to do this stuff for my long-term career.

Not only has this internship made me much more confident in my decision to pursue

Mass Communications as a major but also more specifically I have discovered what exact types

of work I gravitate towards more within the umbrella of Communications. The most major of

these types of skills is editing. I did a lot of video editing for PAC14, and it made me realize how

much I love editing not only video but audio as well. Editing is like a jigsaw puzzle in a way. For

example, when you sit down to begin sifting through the footage that needs editing you have to

figure out the optimal arrangement of clips, audio, and background music. There are so many
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options to choose from but if you arrange those elements in the way that is just right it will result

in a perfect combination in a video for the best version on that project.

Along with finding more confidence in my decision of careers there are other things I am

really proud of about my experience being an intern. One of the biggest things would have to be

when I had finished editing some promotional videos and even regular programs and was able to

see my work on the television station. Being able to let my skills show through as well as

developing new skills that would better the end product is something I am very proud of. Being

able expand my skills is something I will always be proud of because the continual growth of

skills is what keeps professions moving forward. It gives a stronger sense of pride in something

when it is not only approved for on-air, but you also know how much work went into trying to

get the product as good as it possibly could be before running it. Another set of wonderfully

proud moments during my time as an intern for PAC14 were when I worked so hard on a promo

or program and the station got feedback which they passed along to me.

Another thing I am very proud of about this work is that near the end of our time with

PAC14 my fellow intern and I worked together on a short film for the Ocean City Film

Challenge. Having to work together with another person for one specific film project that wasn’t

for the main stations purpose of having programs on television was an interesting thing to work

on. The other intern did most of the filming while I edited and did most of the pre-production

paperwork, such as shooting script storyboard and even created props for the film. This project

was interesting to do with another person who I had to coordinate and troubleshoot last minute

problems. This was helpful to push through and have something at the end of this time to submit

to be judged. This film has even recently been chosen to be viewed with only a select number of

other entries that are moving on.

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Often times you will disappoint either yourself or others in life and especially in

professional life. One major area which would often disappoint myself about my work during

this internship is how long I would take to edit programs that I felt should be able to be done

before I am done with them. This might have pushed me to try to make my work the best it could

be since I felt I was disappointing people with how long I was taking to finish my work. This is

something I had to push through to try to not disappoint other people as well. I do believe this

cycle, while at the time may or may not have been necessary or good, I would go through has

helped me in the long run. I believe I have learned how to stay calm and not think about what

others are thinking about how meticulous I may be on a project unless it takes me a significant

amount of time to finish.

Another powerful thing I have learned through this internship was the office dynamics.

While this might have less to do with the type of internship I did I do believe it is important for

people do have experience working with people in an office setting. Most jobs have at least a

time where you must share an office space and work together even when you have independent

projects to work on. The skills of working in an office don’t always come naturally so it is

important even when they do come naturally to exercise those skills. Whether you share and

office building or an actual office room this is important to know and understand going into a

professional life outside of college. Often times you don’t know the office etiquette, but it is

nevertheless important to figure out and adapt to. These skills will transfer over to other

professional interactions even if you go on to not work in an office space because as a

professional you will have to communicate with other people you are working with whether they

are co-workers or people that have you under contract to do work for them.
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Aside from the main programs we used to edit programs together I was able to explore

some other programs that we had access to but were not mandatory to use. A perfect example of

this is Apple Motion. I was about to make different kinds of graphics from scratch to drop into

programs as just about any kind of graphic you can think of. This was not necessary because

there were pre-made graphics however one time this was really great was when I made a moving

end graphic using a local non-profit organization’s logo. I believe developing these skills with

things that are helpful but are not a necessity is a great thing to not only better the promotional

videos I made for this organization but also helped me develop skills that would be extremely

helpful in the future.

The most major advantage I feel that came from my time with PAC14 is the hands on, in

person experience. I personally believe that since the global pandemic began a lot of the courses

that would have prepared me and the other people in my major were put into a situation where

we had to adapt. While this did pose a large problem that students and teachers had to deal with,

and we learned a while different set of skills that we wouldn’t have without this, but I do believe

I wound up gaining even more than I would have through the internship because of this. There

were a lot of things that I knew but didn’t feel confident in due to my limited hands-on

experience but after the last three months I do feel a lot more confident and capable.

When I entered this internship, I was worried that due to the limitations that were put on

everything after the global pandemic locked down the entire country, I would have massive gaps

in knowledge. I felt this way because there were a number of classes and teachers that lacked the

ability to show the actual technical aspects the class would normally cover. This was no ones

fault but left me concerned I was going to enter the workforce and feel like I was sinking beneath

my deficiencies in those areas. To my great surprise and relief once I was in the environment I
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did feel a lot more capable and qualified and even when there were things I needed assistance in,

early on especially, they were things I was able to grasp quickly and keep on going with the

heavy duty work.

Along with duties that helped me further expand my experience in my field of study there

were things to do that were more like office duties. There were things for example like this one

day me and the other intern were asked to put together giveaway items for the stations table at

the Third Friday event in downtown Salisbury. These items consisted of little sticks of Chapstick

in a holder that also had dual purpose as a glasses cleaner. This task was given to us and we were

asked to prep as many of them as possible. In a matter of ten to twenty minutes we had managed

to prep all of the holders in the big box we were given. While this doesn’t have to do with media

production directly it is a great example of things that will be a part of jobs as a side the

sometimes to raise awareness of something and sometimes it’ll just be a promotional thing to get

people interested. No matter the reasoning in most office spaces, especially in media production,

there will be things like this that need doing so you get get the word out about what your

organization does and who you are.

For example, before this internship I didn’t know PAC14 did training for local producers.

This is a fact that many more people should be aware of. I personally have lived in the area for

over ten years and yet never new I could go to this public access channel and get training and

know-how on the subject matter I would later go on to university level to learn. I can only

imagine how much more knowledgeable and confident I would have gone into my college

experience had I know this. Not only do they offer this type of help through courses but

throughout my time there I noticed regular people who have gone through training sessions there

but continue to do programs using the facility. These regulars tend to know what they are doing
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but even when they have a question the environment is such that they could go to one of the

producers there and get a hand or an opinion on what they are doing, and the staff is happy to

help.

I really wish I had been aware of these services as I grew up because of this. I would have

learned so much but at my own pace and fallen in love with the profession sooner, in a place I

could have easily flourished. While I still got here, I think having this at peoples disposal is

incredibly helpful for people as they are approaching college level. As a young child I extremely

slowly discovered my love for this time of thing but couldn’t identify the profession for many

years but if I had been introduced to things like this, I feel my journey would have been much

more straightforward. I bring this up strictly to express that things like this should be praised and

pointed out and publicized. Even though I have been around the area since the beginning of my

interest in media I never knew they could help me in these ways. If I had known and was able to

be taught and somewhat guided by these wonderful people, I would have been so much more

sure in my early college years.

All in all, I gained so much from this internship. Not only did I learn how to better edit

video productions but working with other people and learning to create graphics from scratch

using Apple Motion which was not a requirement. I learned to work in an office environment

and have much better interpersonal skills on a daily basis. Considering it was only three months I

would say I expanded my knowledge and skills so much and now I feel significantly more

prepared for life after graduation. I will also say this channel and group of producers and staff

deserve to be much more known of and appreciated. They all work so hard not only to get

programs out but to help other do the same and enjoy themselves.