LINK Internship Description:
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Animas High School offers a unique internship program to all their juniors. Leading Internships for New Knowledge (LINK) allows juniors to take three weeks off from their normal class schedules to work in a field of their choosing. Students spend 90 hours working with their mentors applying their skills outside the classroom and in a workplace. For more information, visit ahsinternships.weebly.com.
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Changes Due to COVID-19
Due to COVID-19, my original plans on interning with the Durango Fire Department during my junior year was cancelled. After finding my recent passion for engineering, I was able to reach out to Goff during my senior year and arrange a COVID safe internship. Instead of having three weeks off from classes, I logged 60 hours whilst in school.
My Internship:
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My internship was at Goff Engineering & Surveying. Goff is a multi-disciplinary consulting firm based in Durango, Colorado. After starting as a civil engineering firm, Goff branched out and now also includes structural engineering and surveying. I choose this internship because I plan on going to college for engineering and valued having real world experience in a workplace before finalizing my career path.
Goff Engineering and Surveying website: www.goffengineering.com/ |
Reflection:
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Through this internship, I learned that I am passionate about engineering and want to continue getting to know the different types there are before specifying my major in college. Also through getting the experience of both the office side of the job, as well as the surveying part, I found that I would love to be able to have a combination of the two when I go into a workplace.
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Similar to school, I learned that having the skill of time management is very important in the professional world. There are important deadlines, and when working with a large group of people, it is crucial to hold up your end of the project.
In the beginning, one of the challenges I was faced with was learning how to use autocad. It is a very complex tool that takes time to get comfortable with. A key aspect to my growth within this challenge was not being afraid to ask as many questions as I needed. This was partnered with getting comfortable in a setting where everything was new for me.
If dealt with correctly, challenges tend to become strengths in the long run. After completing my internship, I now feel mostly comfortable with the autocad software, which will be a great head start for college and future jobs/internships. I also got appreciable practice with branching out and challenging myself to be confident around new places and people.
This internship was a great experience and gave me a handful of new insights. This includes the idea of keeping my options open when it comes to which specific type of engineering I plan to study. I was able to discover that although civil engineering might not be the best fit for me, there are a multitude of other options, or other branches of civil engineering that could become my passion.
Alongside the new knowledge I have gained from this internship, I was also able to sit down and talk with a couple different people within Goff Engineering, including my mentor. They all gave me great advice such as: arranging internships all throughout college, keeping an open mind to all the different types of engineering, as well as any other type of major/job that I may find a passion for in the future, managing your time in college to fit a general job timeline, etc.
In the beginning, one of the challenges I was faced with was learning how to use autocad. It is a very complex tool that takes time to get comfortable with. A key aspect to my growth within this challenge was not being afraid to ask as many questions as I needed. This was partnered with getting comfortable in a setting where everything was new for me.
If dealt with correctly, challenges tend to become strengths in the long run. After completing my internship, I now feel mostly comfortable with the autocad software, which will be a great head start for college and future jobs/internships. I also got appreciable practice with branching out and challenging myself to be confident around new places and people.
This internship was a great experience and gave me a handful of new insights. This includes the idea of keeping my options open when it comes to which specific type of engineering I plan to study. I was able to discover that although civil engineering might not be the best fit for me, there are a multitude of other options, or other branches of civil engineering that could become my passion.
Alongside the new knowledge I have gained from this internship, I was also able to sit down and talk with a couple different people within Goff Engineering, including my mentor. They all gave me great advice such as: arranging internships all throughout college, keeping an open mind to all the different types of engineering, as well as any other type of major/job that I may find a passion for in the future, managing your time in college to fit a general job timeline, etc.
My Project:
For my project, I designed a multi-use path and bridge for the new Animas High School campus. Due to time constraints, I wasn't able to personalize a specific design for the bridge, so I ended up taking an already existing bridge and fitting it to my plan.
