Tag Archives: 2018

A Postcard From: Francesca Agnello ’18

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Name: Francesca Agnello
Class Year: 2018
Major: Anthropology
Minor: Italian
Hometown: Livingston, N.J.
Internship Placement: Canaday Library
Job Title: Digital Curriculum Intern
Location: Bryn Mawr College

What’s happening at your internship?

I’ve been doing a lot of tech documentation recently (specifically for the new version of Moodle), which is something I’ve never tried before and sounds pretty dry but is something I actually really enjoy. I’ve also started using Adobe Premiere Pro CC to edit videos about blended learning in the liberal arts; I’ve never played around with audiovisual editing before, either. There are three of us Digital Curriculum Interns, so we’re all working together to solve problems, learn Premiere, and figure out BiONiC. We also work in the same room as the AR/VR Interns who are working with the HoloLens, so we DC interns are sometimes their guinea pigs for their apps, which is really fun (and also terrifying because my brain truly believes the holograms are real).

Why did you apply for this internship?

This past semester I was working with Alicia Peaker as one of her Digital Scholarship Research Assistants, and wanted to use this summer to continue honing my digital competencies. Alicia mentioned this internship to us RAs as the perfect way to do this. I was also really intrigued by the 9-to-5 work schedule, which is something I haven’t had experience with.

What is most rewarding about your internship?

Even though I’m not directly helping anyone with this internship, some of the projects we’re working on are meant to help future first-years make the transition into Bryn Mawr College by making educational tools (like Moodle and BiONiC) easier to understand and use. And since this internship is all about finding innovative new ways of teaching others, I’d like to think that some of our projects are going to help non-traditional learners succeed at Bryn Mawr as well as traditional learners. By advocating for blended learning, for example, we’re supporting potential tools and technologies that could help BMC students learn in their own unique ways.

I also think that by being the “guinea pigs” of the college’s efforts to bring digital competencies to the forefront of campus awareness, we can offer valuable insight into how these efforts can prove the most effective. And understanding these competencies is important not only because they’re great to vocalize on resumes and cover letters, but because they also help us recognize our own learning processes.

What is something you have learned from your internship that you didn’t expect?

So far, I’ve had two major “ah-ha” moments in this internship. My first occurred when I was on my lunch break running some errands for myself. I was walking back from Campus Safety (to get a parking permit for my car) and I suddenly realized that this was the first time where, during a work-laden week, I used my lunch break to do something for me instead of rushing around getting to class, frantically finishing up a reading, or printing an assignment. I was doing a chore that I needed to do, but it didn’t have the same sense of desperate urgency that my academic duties have. And I realized in the parking lot behind the Campus Center that I really, really enjoy having a 9-to-5 schedule, where my lunch breaks are my own and when I leave work at the end of the day, I actually have some time for myself.

My second epiphany came when I was learning how to use Premiere. I had never used such comprehensive video-editing software before, so suddenly having to edit video and audio with video overlays and face-blurring was quite daunting. To prepare, I watched an hour-long tutorial on Lynda.com and tried my best to follow along in the program. And after I watched around 40 minutes of it, I grew too frustrated to continue the tutorial. So, I just went for it. Luckily, my two other DC coworkers had also just learned the program a few days prior, so they were able to answer questions I had. And I’m proud to say I picked it up a lot quicker than I anticipated. When I was marveling how fast I had learned to use such a program, I realized that had I needed to learn the program to do an academic project with a strict, set deadline, I would have been too stressed and frustrated to actually learn the program. With these editing projects, however, there are flexible deadlines because we are also responsible for other projects at the same time. And because of this flexibility, I was able to begin learning without anxiety. Long story short, this epiphany taught me how I actually learn (and “Metacognition and Life-Long Learning” is one of those digital competencies I was talking about!). During the school year, I don’t have the time nor the energy to reflect upon my learning process, so this internship has already taught me about myself in under two weeks!

A Postcard From: Codie Fielder Kawaguchi ’18

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Name: Codie Fiedler Kawaguchi
Class Year: 2018
Major: Physics
Hometown: Bainbridge Island, Wash.

Internship Placement:
Job Title: Research Assistant
Location: University Of Michigan

This summer I am interning at the University of Michigan, as a part of the Climate and Space Science and Engineering team. Although my day-to-day work is relatively straightforward (running data analysis on hydrodynamic instabilities), I have also found myself attending department meetings and even participating in the coffee hour ritual (coffee and biscotti everyday at 3 p.m.).

I applied to this internship as a means of branching out while remaining in my preferred field, plasma physics — but the biscotti is also a plus.

Last summer was the first time I got into plasma physics research; at that time I was focused mainly on fusion energy and turbulence. I participated in Summer Science Research at Bryn Mawr College, where I worked in Professor David Schaffner’s Plasma lab. During this experience, we not only prepared for the end of summer Symposium, held at Bryn Mawr College, but we also geared up for the Department of Plasma Physics Conference, otherwise known as DPP. It was at this conference where I met Carolyn and she told me about the internship she planned to set up.

I was excited to work with Carolyn because it meant I could not only, see a whole new side of plasma physics, but also work with a fellow Mawrter. It has been great to hear from Carolyn what it was like to go from a small liberal arts school in undergrad to a huge university for graduate school. Moreover, it has been helpful and somewhat encouraging to hear about her experience going from a women’s college, and then entering into a male-dominated subject. She has said that her time at Bryn Mawr gave her the strength that she needed to survive in such an environment, and I have often believed that this would be the case for me as well.

Aside from transitioning from Bryn Mawr College, where it’s only a 10-minute walk to the lab from Erdman, to the University of Michigan where campus spans an entire city, I would say my biggest challenge has been navigating the Space Science Research Building. This structure is not only massive, but it is currently undergoing renovation. Because so many of the hallways are blocked off as you walk through, you are constantly being rerouted. It has been quite an adventure figuring out how to get from point A to B.

A Postcard From: Emmeline Douglas-Mann ’18

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Name: Emmeline Douglas-Mann
Class Year: 2018
Major: Physics
Hometown: Petrockstowe, Devon, U.K.
Internship Placement: Center for Laser Experimental Astrophysical Research, University of Michigan
Job Title: Research Assistant
Location: Ann Arbor, Michigan

What’s happening at your internship?

I’m a research assistant at the Center for Laser Experimental Astrophysical Research (CLEAR) at the University of Michigan. CLEAR models and creates hot dense plasmas to study astrophysical processes in the laboratory. I’m building simulations to study hydrodynamic instabilities and analyzing the results.

Why did you apply for this internship?

I’m very interested in plasma physics and I hope to do further study in this area once I graduate. This internship was a great opportunity to learn more about the field, to develop skills in simulations, and experience the research environment at a large university.

What has been your favorite part of this internship?

Working in a big research group and meeting lots of new people.

What has been the biggest challenge you have faced at your internship?

Employment paperwork.

A Postcard From: Caiwei Shao ’18

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Name: Caiwei Shao
Year: 2018
Major: Economics and Mathematics
Hometown: Shandong, China
Internship Job Title: Research Assistant
Location: Beijing

What’s happening at your internship?

I work with a group of graduate school students, mostly Ph.D. candidates, and professors on their annual research paper about national accounts. Most of works I do is to support other group members for further analysis and research. I’m currently collecting previous literature and working papers in similar fields and trying to analyze the common elements under different methodology and results. I’m also responsible for collecting data from various resources and databases and adjusting them to a useful from for regression analysis.

Why did you apply for this internship?

As I want to apply for graduate school, my advisor suggested that I apply for an internship as a research assistant to see and experience how a professor works and how research progresses. I feel that this is a great opportunity for me to get more knowledge about a doctoral program, and it will help me to reflect on my career decisions after graduating from Bryn Mawr.

What has been your favorite part of this internship?

It is such a great opportunity for me to work and spend time with all the professors and Ph.D. candidates in this institution. Besides the academic work we do together, we always have lunch together and hang out on campus. As we have different backgrounds and experiences, I learn a lot of new things in our conversation. There are people who work after graduation and decide to continue to study in school after several years, and there are people who have an entirely different major in undergraduate school and find they like economics accidentally. I’m not only impressed by their professional skills, but also by their devotion to this subject and effort they are willing to put in their work. I learn a lot from them besides the academic knowledge, and they also give me advice for my study and following application. I feel very lucky to be around this group of people, and they are certainly my favorite part of this internship.

What has been the biggest challenge you have faced at this internship?

Even though I have almost finished my major plan in Economics, things I learned in school are not sufficient to complete my assigned tasks. I was first supposed to test a regression model by myself, but I found there are a lot of methodologies that I don’t understand and I couldn’t finish this task. Therefore, I borrowed many textbooks from seniors and asked questions more frequently, trying to fill the gap between them and me.

Welcome Summer 2017!

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Welcome to the Summer Internship blog!

With Bryn Mawr students interning across the globe, this blog will offer a glance at what they are completing throughout their summer break. We’ve asked them to send in “postcards” from their internship, highlighting the work they are doing, their experience working in the field, or even what it’s like living in a new city for a few months.

Enjoy your summer and this Summer Internship blog!