With many students at Anderson University (AU) knowledgeable about social media and how to manage their personal accounts, new opportunities are arising for internships. Out of many people on campus, there are two students who had unique experiences in separate career fields to work managing social media.
Madalyn Shiderly is a senior at Anderson University majoring in cinema and media arts. Over the summer, Shiderly worked on AU’s campus as a social media manager for the Center of Cyber Security. In this position, she pursued content creation, media scheduling and method research. While this job could seem overwhelming to some, Shiderly found it to be an incredible opportunity to learn this craft.
Shiderly stumbled upon the job posting on AU’s website and thought it would be a great way to learn skills that pushed her out of her comfort zone. Not only was it a great opportunity she shared, but it had an excellent work schedule that fit her lifestyle.
“One of the most difficult aspects was that the job required a lot more marketing experience than I initially realized,” said Shiderly. “I had no prior experience in marketing so I had to learn on the fly, but once I got some terms and practices down I felt a lot more comfortable.”
Another student in the same area of study had a similar experience last summer during her internship.
Jordan Bick is a senior at Anderson University also majoring in cinema and media arts. Bick had the opportunity to work as a video production intern for a company in Albany, New York, called 121 Innovations, Inc.
According to Bick, the beginning of the internship was a little rocky but slowly improved over time.
To start the summer, 121 Innovations, Inc. asked their interns to create an imaginary business and practice promoting it to their employer as a training exercise. One of the difficulties that Bick faced when doing this part of the internship was how to promote her company and ask the right questions.
“Surprisingly, the best parts of this internship were not the assignments, but what I learned for my future occupations,” said Bick. “I was taught how to use ChatGPT for gaining information and creating videos and scripts for future productions. I was taught about Pitch Decks and how to pitch a business to potential investors and consumers. I was taught how to review resumes and weed out the best candidates for future employment. All these skills will be utilized and valuable for most of my jobs in the future, and I’m so glad I was given the opportunity to learn about them.”
While both of these students worked with different companies and had unique internship experiences, they both learned how to create content that can market a company or business through social media.
Though faced with challenges and new experiences, these young women applied their skills to real-world experiences, and displayed how they are capable of learning how to adapt and grow in a new environment and world that is consistently technologically advancing.
Reagan Conkling is a junior from St. James, Missouri, majoring in public relations. Reagan is an associate with Fifth Street Communications, a student-run public relations agency at Anderson University.