My internship started at 10 pm the night before my first day with my roommates. We decided to go and scout out my parking spot for my first day that night because of how much first day jitters I was having. I was so nervous to start my internship at the North Carolina Wildlife Resources Commission. I knew how important the agency was to the entirety of North Carolina. They protect and conserve our state’s wildlife and I was so excited to be a part of something bigger than myself. My internship was with their policy and analysis division but I worked closely with their wildlife education division as well. The policy and analysis division completes tasks like program development and evaluation which is what I participated in, as well as many other things such as surveys of constituents, and rule making.

The program evaluation that I worked on this summer was for their volunteer program. Before this internship I had an interest in volunteering specifically with conservation and environmental groups so when I saw the opportunity I jumped at it. This experience has shown me that I have a real passion for how our communities tie in with the greater conservation need. I want to continue to participate in volunteer programs like the one at NCWRC as part of the team behind the coordination as well as part of the team on the ground. Volunteering is a great way to connect with and give back to your community; and when you are volunteering for conservation you are giving back on an even larger scale. As for the responsibilities during my internship I worked on creating a logic model, an annotated bibliography, three interview guides, completing 24 interviews with various staff members and volunteers, and generating a final report of my findings.

At first the office aspect of my internship was hard for me to get used to because I am such an outdoorsy person. I spend most of my time out in nature so getting used to office work was something that took time. However, my supervisor and fellow interns made the office an entertaining learning environment where I built life long connections. My supervisor also set up outside of the office learning experiences for me to get out of the office and learn about different divisions and aspects of the agency. Overall I enjoyed the internship with NCWRC greatly and learned so much throughout my experience. I developed a logic model for the first time to show the agency a visual representation of how the volunteer program’s intended work leads to real conservation results. I also was able to talk to so many different people from different walks of life that gave me different perspectives on conservation. Such as how hunting and shooting sports connect to conservation which I had no previous knowledge about.

My favorite part of the internship was being able to connect with so many people on something I was really passionate about. The entire summer didn’t feel like a job because of how much enjoyment I got out of meeting and discussing conservation and volunteering with various different people. Each day was different and brought up new challenges for me to figure out and overcome, even if that challenge was figuring out the printer.

From here I learned that I may want to do something more outside for my career. However, I definitely want a career that pushes me like this internship I had and that contributes to conservation on a large scale. The feeling of knowing I was participating in something that was going to make real change felt empowering. I can see myself looking for jobs within this agency and companies like it after graduation. I really did enjoy my internship this summer with the North Carolina Resources Commission and recommend working with them to any student looking for a place to flourish and grow.