Student Perspective: The Job You’ll Remember Forever

by Nick Raport, CAS ’12

So you’re looking for a job.

But not just any job. You want a job that will impress future employers, develop skills, pay you, and will be fun.

However, you know that those jobs don’t exist.

You’re wrong.

I’m a Team Coordinator for the Office of New Student Orientation and Academic Initiatives. When translated from the Penn jargon, that means I am one of the student workers who helps to put together and run New Student Orientation every fall, along with the events for the academic theme year the Provost’s Office sponsors.

During the summer, I plan all of those events you remember with fondness from your time as a freshman. Last fall, I personally oversaw Late Nights, the Penn Reading Project, and the Toga Party, to name just a few. Through the process of planning these, I built working relationships with Penn faculty and administration, both local and national businesses, and student leaders from every kind of organization imaginable. I learned how to properly compile budgets and file them within the University system, gained a working knowledge of the entire Adobe and Microsoft Office software suites, and how to run a virtual orientation using current social networking sites. I learned what to tell building administrators in order to let my event go longer without an extra charge, what to tell a caterer to get a few extra items, and how to ensure that vendors donate items for events like Pennfest.

I also maintain two major Penn websites, NSO and the Theme Year, constantly updating them and making sure they are both accurate and composed of the newest features.  Before I started this job, I just assumed that websites made themselves and were just for my viewing pleasure.

During NSO, you’re going to work. A lot. And you’ll be frustrated. You’ll want go home and sleep. Instead you’ll keep going beyond what you thought was possible. But the satisfaction of seeing all those students having the time of their lives at something that you have overseen from the moment it was proposed until the doors opened is worth it. Months later, you’ll pass people on Locust and they’ll be talking about how they want to go back to NSO, to dance amidst the statues of the PMA, to dress in togas with their entire class, and you’ll smile. Because you will know that you made that happen, that you are the reason those memories exist in the first place.

This job is very real, and not your imagination at all. This is the job you want on your resume. This is the job you will remember forever.

To apply to the NSOAI Management Internship Program for this year, search Penn Link for job #745101.  For more information, contact Troy Majnerick , Assistant Director of New Student Orientation.

Author: Student Perspective

Views and opinions from current Penn students.

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