Samantha LaRose ’17
The spring installment of “Meet the Interns,” a student internship panel, was held on Monday, March 6 for the entire Siena community. This biannual event is aimed at providing students who are about to begin the process of applying for internships the knowledge and advice they will need from peers who have already gathered the tips and tricks. The six students that participated in the panel discussion have had or currently hold internship positions at a broad range of companies, from Saratoga Living Magazine to the Parks, Recreation and Historic Development department for New York State.
During the event, the student interns sat side by side at the front of the room and fielded questions asked by Amy Stringer, recruitment operations manager and Haley Weber '15, resource manager from Linium Staffing, a local recruiting agency and the internship site of one of the panelists. These included questions such as when is the best time to start applying for internships, what are the best resources to use in order to search for internship positions, and what to do when one discovers that his or her internship is not the right fit.
Sophomore Jacob Perry, an intern at Northwestern Mutual shared, “If you go into work at an internship and you say this isn’t really my thing or it’s not my sort of taste, then you’ve explored the internship correctly; you’ve found out where your passion lies, and you have made the determination to move forward. That’s what it’s all about – that’s what internships are for.”
The diverse backgrounds of each of the student interns allowed for them to share their own individual perspectives and experiences on various topics, proving that everyone’s internship process is different and no single path is the correct one.
Students often mistakenly believe that when they choose an internship, it has to be in the field that they are eventually going to pursue a career in after college. Many of the interns on the panel shared that they have had other experiences that helped them to realize what they did and did not want to do for a living. “Meet the Interns” helps to ease the fear surrounding internships and get Saints excited and prepared to take the next step in their college careers.
Panelists included:
Jacob Perry ’19, Northwestern Mutual
Nicolette DiMaggio ’17, Fenimore Asset Management, Inc.
Alicia Bryan ’17, Saratoga Living Magazine
Jacob Costello ’19, Siena College Stack Center for Innovation and Entrepreneurship
Alyx Gleason ’19- The Energy and Sustainability Office at the NYS Office of Parks, Recreation, and Historic Preservation
Monica Sweeney ’17, Linium Recruiting
The “Meet the Interns” panel was sponsored by the Office of Internship Programs, Community Living and the Career Education and Professional Development Office.
