Retrospect and Prospects
Posted on: March 22, 2011
It’s time for a little retrospect. I promise I won’t go all maudlin on you, but this being the last week of my internship it seems unavoidable to write about lessons learned, skills developed, co-operations co-operated.
In the early stages of my internship, I often had trouble saying what I did in a day, because it was all variations on a theme: I updated the website. (That entailed a huge variety of activities in itself, of course, but I hate to bog people down with details.) Now, though, I find that I have quite a list to walk away with. I oversaw the launch of a new website; I edited and created hundreds of pages of online content; I created a holiday guide (using graphic design skills I didn’t know I had); I developed a promotional video; I created newsletters, brochures, guidebooks, images, and the occasional tweet; and I blogged until my metaphorical fingers bled. (Also, there was a heck of a lot of data entry–but, for the sake of my sanity, I’m not going to dwell on that.) I got a good long look into what goes into corporate communications, and learned that I can do it.
Whether I will continue to do it is still up in the air. But I’m excited about where these skills can take me; I’ve begun exploring possibilities of starting up something independent with my creative work, and everything I’ve learned here can help me get that ball rolling. I have a great love and respect of the arts–which are, like co-ops, underfunded and under-respected in Canada at the moment–and am eager to see what my new copywriting and communicating prowess can do to help.
And that, I think, is high praise for this program: after my six months with On Co-op, I feel better able to do the work I want to do in the world. I don’t ask for any more than that.
