Career Readiness
Internship
I "interned" at the Natural History Museum of Utah (NHMU); they considered me a volunteer, but I still had a mentor. And let me tell you, many kids were indifferent about their internships, but I think I might have gotten the coolest one out there! Let me tell you why.
Summer Camps
I chose NHMU because of their summer camps. Because I want to be a teacher, and the summer camps were in a classroom setting, I thought it'd be a great place to see what running a class was like. Of course, I wasn't the teacher, but I was an assistant ,and was very involved in preparing for each day and taking care of the kids.
While NHMU has camps for kindergarten through 6th grade, I ended up working with the kindergarteners every week I was there. That was kind of funny to me, because I actually wanted to be a high school teacher, but ended up with the very youngest group. However, I don't regret that; in fact, I'm very grateful. It was so much fun to work with the little kids. Not only were they loving and adorable, but very curious, and so it was fun to help inspire an interest in science in them.
I also realized that they have a simple sense of humor like me, and so where some of my friends and family wouldn't appreciate something I thought was funny, the little kids would. :)
Now, while I still think I would enjoy teaching high school, I'm leaning towards elementary. I still don't know that I'd really want to teach kindergarten, because as much fun as it is, I want to teach kids more than finger-painting.
Collections
Most of my internship was spent with the summer camps, however, my mentor was actually in a completely different department, so I got to try some other cool things with her. She was a paleontologist, so most of the time I was helping her organize fossils in Collections. I met several new people there; I got to know a volunteer, and even an AMES alumni!
Visitors can only see Collections with a narrow (in comparison to the room) window, however, it's very important. It's like a library of bones that other museums and especially universities borrow from, so it's very important that it stays organized. However, NHMU had moved to a new building only two years before, so they still had a lot of unpacking to do (they have a lot of stuff).
Unpacking wasn't the only thing we did though. We did have to re-pack something too. I remember someone in Colorado needed to borrow the bones of a ceratopsian (I learned a lot about dinosaurs from my mentor :D) so that he could make a copy for display. However, he ended up having to get it early, so we had to hurry and pack it up for him. Because of our help, in a few years, there's going to be a "baby" (it's actually not a baby, just young; "baby" sounds cuter though) ceratopsian with the adult on display in the museum. It's going to be super cute!
Fossil Preparation Lab
One of my favorite things that my mentor had me do was help in the Fossil Prep. Lab. First of all, how many teenagers can say they've gotten to wear a real lab coat in a real lab? So that was pretty exciting. But I also really enjoyed the work I was doing in there. I got to "inscribe" a fossil, meaning, I used a mini-jackhammer to chip the rock off of a dinosaur tooth. Cool, right? On another day I used a toothbrush (they have an interesting assortment of tools) to clean what I thought were just black rocks, until my mentor revealed to me that they were actually bones!
I never thought I would have any interest in paleontology, but because of this internship and my mentor, I realize that it's actually a really fun and interesting field. I don't know that I'll go into it, but I'm definitely considering it.
While I finished my internship, I fell in love with the museum, and have continued to volunteer there since. In fact, I'm looking at applying for a job there this summer. I remember that I had never been there before this internship, and I was expecting it to just be a boring place with some dinosaurs on display. However, I was pleasantly surprised. The architecture alone is worthy of a tour! But I think what I like best about the museum is that it rekindles my sense of wonder and curiosity. After not going up there for most of the school year, I went to a volunteer workshop in January and just felt so refreshed. Life is just so much more beautiful on the way home from the museum. :)
Summer Camps
I chose NHMU because of their summer camps. Because I want to be a teacher, and the summer camps were in a classroom setting, I thought it'd be a great place to see what running a class was like. Of course, I wasn't the teacher, but I was an assistant ,and was very involved in preparing for each day and taking care of the kids.
While NHMU has camps for kindergarten through 6th grade, I ended up working with the kindergarteners every week I was there. That was kind of funny to me, because I actually wanted to be a high school teacher, but ended up with the very youngest group. However, I don't regret that; in fact, I'm very grateful. It was so much fun to work with the little kids. Not only were they loving and adorable, but very curious, and so it was fun to help inspire an interest in science in them.
I also realized that they have a simple sense of humor like me, and so where some of my friends and family wouldn't appreciate something I thought was funny, the little kids would. :)
Now, while I still think I would enjoy teaching high school, I'm leaning towards elementary. I still don't know that I'd really want to teach kindergarten, because as much fun as it is, I want to teach kids more than finger-painting.
Collections
Most of my internship was spent with the summer camps, however, my mentor was actually in a completely different department, so I got to try some other cool things with her. She was a paleontologist, so most of the time I was helping her organize fossils in Collections. I met several new people there; I got to know a volunteer, and even an AMES alumni!
Visitors can only see Collections with a narrow (in comparison to the room) window, however, it's very important. It's like a library of bones that other museums and especially universities borrow from, so it's very important that it stays organized. However, NHMU had moved to a new building only two years before, so they still had a lot of unpacking to do (they have a lot of stuff).
Unpacking wasn't the only thing we did though. We did have to re-pack something too. I remember someone in Colorado needed to borrow the bones of a ceratopsian (I learned a lot about dinosaurs from my mentor :D) so that he could make a copy for display. However, he ended up having to get it early, so we had to hurry and pack it up for him. Because of our help, in a few years, there's going to be a "baby" (it's actually not a baby, just young; "baby" sounds cuter though) ceratopsian with the adult on display in the museum. It's going to be super cute!
Fossil Preparation Lab
One of my favorite things that my mentor had me do was help in the Fossil Prep. Lab. First of all, how many teenagers can say they've gotten to wear a real lab coat in a real lab? So that was pretty exciting. But I also really enjoyed the work I was doing in there. I got to "inscribe" a fossil, meaning, I used a mini-jackhammer to chip the rock off of a dinosaur tooth. Cool, right? On another day I used a toothbrush (they have an interesting assortment of tools) to clean what I thought were just black rocks, until my mentor revealed to me that they were actually bones!
I never thought I would have any interest in paleontology, but because of this internship and my mentor, I realize that it's actually a really fun and interesting field. I don't know that I'll go into it, but I'm definitely considering it.
While I finished my internship, I fell in love with the museum, and have continued to volunteer there since. In fact, I'm looking at applying for a job there this summer. I remember that I had never been there before this internship, and I was expecting it to just be a boring place with some dinosaurs on display. However, I was pleasantly surprised. The architecture alone is worthy of a tour! But I think what I like best about the museum is that it rekindles my sense of wonder and curiosity. After not going up there for most of the school year, I went to a volunteer workshop in January and just felt so refreshed. Life is just so much more beautiful on the way home from the museum. :)