Hodson Internship Reports, St. John's College, Annapolis: Summer 2024

Hodson Internship Reports

Overview of the 2024 Hodson Internship Awards

*Hosted by an SJC alumnus/a

Abhigya Adhikari ‘26

Creating Possibilities Nepal, Kathmandu, Nepal (hybrid, mostly onsite)

Study the benefits of mother groups and the impact they have on their economic and social independence. Conduct surveys with all of the stakeholders of the mothers’ groups while helping to create possibilities by writing comprehensive reports on their long-term impact.

Erin Allen ‘24

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC), Spatial Ecology and Conservation Lab, Edgewater, MD (onsite)

Conduct an independent research project from study design to data collection, analysis, and communication of results. Develop models of occurrences of ground beetle species in different treatments of a forest restoration experiment. Integrate biodiversity and physiological data with microclimate data from sensor arrays and available high-resolution spatial data.

Semyon Andruschenko ’26

Just Dilijan It! Dilijan United World College, Dilijan, Armenia (onsite)

Assist in a range of educational activities, providing support in both classroom settings and counseling sessions; lead and organize seminars; assist teachers and administrators in the school’s daily tasks.

Parth Bajaj ‘24

METRC (Major Extremity Trauma Research Consortium), Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD (mostly remote)

Provide support for a multicenter clinical trials consortium. Work with Principal Investigators, Biostatisticians, Programmers, and other collaborators on data management, data cleaning, and analyses, for one or more METRC-sponsored projects.

*Isaac Boone ‘26

New Sapience, Annapolis, MD (mostly remote)

Act as an Epistemological Engineering intern to learn the fundamental techniques by which knowledge in their own mind can be curated and transformed into a synthetic form that is completely independent from natural human language. Contribute to the development of the core commonsense world model to support the company’s upcoming commercial product.

Laurali Breeden ‘25

Classic Learning Test (CLT), Annapolis, MD (hybrid)

Receive an introduction to Human Resources (HR) responsibilities and tasks including but not limited to personnel onboarding, policy examinations and revisions, and administering, collecting and organizing employee satisfaction data; participate in the development and enhancement of company policies to effectively cater to the diverse needs of CLT’s employees.

Balaram Briant ‘25

Christopher Newport University, Dept. of Philosophy & Religion, Newport News, VA (hybrid, mostly remote)

Train in the traditional exegetical/commentarial writing and background for understanding classical Sanskrit texts, and the challenges of Sanskrit translational work; includes textual searches for passages that enhance or illuminate texts building commentarial illuminations for the Bhakti Sutra of Narada.

Karolina Butkute ‘25

Maryland Office of the Public Defender, Baltimore, MD (hybrid, mostly remote)

Attend court, a mix of virtual and in-person; assist with discovery summaries; review medical records; assist with communicating with the client and preparing responses to DSS petitions and motions.

Delaney Costello ‘25

Breakthrough Collaborative, Fort Worth, TX (onsite)

Work as a teaching fellow for a nonprofit program that targets students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and provides them with rigorous teaching and personal connections; teach civics to rising seventh graders and help build a culture that gets students excited to come to school every day.

Sophia Derico ‘26

Maryland State Archives, Special Collections & Library Services, Annapolis, MD

Assist Special Collections & Conservation staff with rehousing collection materials, describing un-accessioned records, and performing light paper mends; work will include data entry.

Maya Dickerson ‘26

Greenfield Library, Archives, St. John’s College, Annapolis, MD

Introduction to the basic tasks of archival work, including arrangement, description, preservation, and digitization; learn about the St. John’s College Archives and complete a focused project with the College History Collection.

Tallis Estevez ‘24

City of Annapolis, Planning & Zoning, Annapolis, MD (hybrid, mostly remote)

Exposure to research-based facets of city planning while assisting with relevant projects that advance the City’s comprehensive planning goals. Includes research into best practices in bike/pedestrian planning and design, affordable housing, mixed use development, stormwater management, and other topics.

Michael Fahey ‘27

Kezlo Group, Annapolis, MD (hybrid)

Assist in varied architectural projects; survey existing buildings in need of renovation; learn architectural software such as Revit and model buildings using it; and create and format presentations for clients.

Helen Felbek ‘25

DENEFF (Deutsche Unternehmensinitiative Energieeffizienz e.V., (Decarbonization of Industry), Berlin, Germany (hybrid)

Intern in public affairs providing assistance in developing an action plan to navigate the industry through the ongoing gas crisis; provide administrative and content related support for the organization; collaboration in the political campaigns at the national and EU level; coordinate appointments with Members of Parliament (MdBs), playing a role in developing tools and event formats for the innovative decarbonization platform.

Elliot Feldman ‘26

Kingsbridge Historical Society, Bronx, NY (onsite)

Catalog and organize the archives of the historical society according to the standard museum/library practices, learning best practices in museum collections management; help manage a nonprofit historical society with research, office work, and website update.

Gabriela Forte ‘27

Maryland Office of the Public Defender, Harford County, Bel Air, MD

Assist with case review and preparation in a fast-paced and demanding work environment; assist with client interviews and consultations in cases where the clients are pending trial on pretrial release as well as clients who are incarcerated.

Georgia Galardi-Pittard ’25

Green Tree Mind, Personal Intern to Dr. Robyn Gisbert, Denver, CO (hybrid)

Read assigned articles, journals, and books; edit and publish Dr. Gisbert’s weekly podcast; and assist with group physical therapy for people with disabilities.

Catherine Greer ‘25

Stan Hywet Hall & Gardens, Akron, Ohio (onsite)

Assist with the reorganization of the storage area of a museum with a focus on historical art; provide inventory and condition assessments; help with inventory and archival research; update the collections management database.

Mia Guill ‘27

Virginia Holocaust Museum, Richmond, VA (onsite)

Support and assist with the development of educational programming and resources; assemble resources for teachers attending an annual workshop.

Henry Haggard ’27

ACLU of Virginia, Richmond, VA (hybrid)

Work with the program staff to build legal research; engage with the community; and analyze policy issues related to civil liberties and civil rights violations. Participate in policy memo development and writing, candidate research, assist with coalition work, and support legal team.

Deidre Hansen ‘27

Salida Regional Library, Salida, CO (onsite)

Help digitize and scan photographs and historical artifacts into the library collection; assist the library staff with tasks, including working at the circulation desk and shelving.

Nelli Harutyunyan ‘24

VOA Eurasia Division, Washington, DC (hybrid)

Work on VOA Armenian social media by preparing social media content; film TV reports targeting a young audience in Armenia; learn how to video edit and film; translate news scripts from English into Armenian.

Rachel Hauben ‘25

Nuclear Ship Savannah Services (NSSS), Baltimore, MD (onsite)

Provide support for the development and editing of technical procedures; draft operating instructions for radiation detection instruments, and author at least one technical document from conception to approval.

Zeinep Ibragim Kyzy ‘24

SADA Consulting LLC, Prague, Czech Republic (onsite)

Conduct comprehensive research on immigration laws, policies, and precedents to support legal cases and client consultation; assist in managing and organizing immigration cases including gathering and reviewing client documentation, preparing forms, and maintaining case files; communicate with clients; draft documents; and provide administrative support.

Ibrahim Ismail ‘25

Office of Innovation, Presidency State House, Abiya, FCT, Nigeria (onsite)

Work as an analyst on initiatives to promote research and development, innovation clusters, and accelerating innovation-driven enterprises; work with the team on the Presidential Initiative for Innovation, Policy Evaluation and Research.

Naeun Jang ‘27

EQUALKEY, Seoul, South Korea (onsite)

Assist in creating groundbreaking educational content for children’s mathematics education that focuses on reminding students of the importance of intuition and creativity in solving math problems, along with formulating original and inventive math problems.

Zachary “Zi” Janszen ‘26

NOAA: South Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve, Charleston, OR (onsite)

Work with Reserve staff to collect vertical elevation data during earthmoving; assist with fish salvage, removing and re-installing ground water wells, building beaver dam analogs; removing invasive species; and downloading stream data and wildlife cameras.

Colin Josler ‘25

Greater Cleveland Habitat for Humanity, Cleveland, OH

Assist with the planning and execution of community events attended by local officials; compile and maintain databases of government funding opportunities; assist with the planning and execution of multiple events including neighborhood Spruce Up Days; help plan the first Local Leader Volunteer Day where elected officials volunteer on Habitat construction sites; and collect data on Habitat’s neighborhood revitalization efforts.

Segyung Jung ‘27

KECM, Seoul, South Korea (hybrid)

Assist with the greenhouse gas management system; support the review of the appropriateness of greenhouse gas reduction projects; analyze domestic and international trends related to the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism.

*Sewi Jung ‘26

Great Books Center, Incheon National University, Incheon, Korea (onsite)

Work on the GB Center homepage construction, archival work, and outreach program including cultivating networks among SJC, INU, and other Korean high schools; serve as an assistant tutor to co-lead seminars.

*Daniel Kim ‘26

Great Books Center, Incheon National University, Incheon, Korea (onsite)

Work on the GB Center homepage construction, archival work, and outreach program including cultivating networks among SJC, INU, and other Korean high schools; serve as an assistant tutor to co-lead seminars.

Dagny Kulkarni ‘24

New York University Press, New York, NY (hybrid)

Update publicity records for books; post on the NYU Press blog; research social media accounts for book portion; input data into ONIX systems; select digital design work; and assist with book mailings and office organization.

Zoe Larsen ‘27

Greenbelt Recreation Department, Summer Theater Program, Greenbelt, MD (onsite)

Provide curatorial work for a visual history exhibit, theatre production work and camper performer mentoring for Creative Kids Camp (ages 6-12) at the Greenbelt Community Center and the Camp Encore (ages 13-17) at the Greenbelt Arts Center.

Amy Le ‘26

New York University Press, New York, NY

Create ad and direct mail copy; update exhibit book list; research academic conference opportunities in emerging fields; design simple ads and fliers; solicit blog entries from authors; support social media outreach and campaigns; and identify and correct errors in rights tracking and management.

Eliane Levy ‘25

Megan McAtee, Independent Welder Fabricator, Austin, TX (onsite)

Participate in the final stages of an art car commission learning automotive customization including metal fabrication, lighting, special effects and pyrotechnics and an introduction to mechanics and maintenance; assist in all aspects of the build and become familiar with hand tools, power tools, various material characteristics, layout and design practices, and safety protocols.

Isaac DongJae Lim ‘25

St. John’s College, Digital Publishing, Annapolis, MD (onsite)

Proofread, edit, and typeset math and laboratory manuals to make them more readable and editable; learn to use LaTeX software program.

Nathaniel Martin ‘24

NOAA: Marine Spatial Ecology Division, National Centers for Coastal Ocean Science (remote)

Work with the communications lead for the Coastal and Marine Planning team to develop infographics related to spatial planning and suitability modeling to better inform the public and demystify “the science behind where.” Receive an overview of the spatial modeling process, then move to visioning and planning for what infographics best describe the process, design, and finalize infographics.

*Jungbin Moon ‘26

Great Books Center, Incheon National University, Incheon, Korea (onsite)

Work on the GB Center homepage construction, archival work, and outreach program including cultivating networks among SJC, INU, and other Korean high schools; serve as an assistant tutor to co-lead seminars.

El’ad Nichols-Kaufman ’25

Pima County Development Services, Tucson, AZ (onsite with small remote component)

Explore planning in local government through assisting with projects handled by the office; take on one specific development project and see it through its various steps of approval; perform clerical work and support for the office’s involvement in the planning process.

Chloe Niedzielski ‘25

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC), MarineGEO Team, Edgewater, MD (onsite)

Conduct policy analysis project on federal and local documents to understand how legislation impacts marine biodiversity. Collect data from three independent case studies: federal, Chesapeake Bay, and Mobile Bay. Create and present a visual representation of collected data and preliminary findings of research questions to the MarineGEO team.

Christopher O’Connor ‘25

GemsOnVhs, Nashville, TN (onsite)

Both in the office and on photo shoots, assist in running a platform that helps in music promotion; create social media that engages fans; perform video editing and on-set production.

Alexander Paden ‘25

Chambers of the Honorable Douglas Nazarian, Appellate Court of Maryland, Annapolis, MD (onsite)

Write memoranda for Judge Nazarian’s briefing cases which will describe the issues in each case, how he recommends the Judge vote and questions for the Judge that would be appropriate for asking the parties’ lawyers at argument; attend a post-argument debriefing session, participate in summer Book Club; and contribute to work of the Chambers.

Alexandra Paul ‘26

New York University Press, New York, NY (hybrid)

Update publicity records for books; post on the NYU Press blog; research social media accounts for book portion; data input into ONIX systems; select digital design work; and assist with book mailings and office organization.

Tia Peterson ‘25

Biospot Lab, University of San Diego, San Diego, CA (onsite)

Perform full-time laboratory research including wetlab protocols, microscopy experiments and data analysis aimed at engineering and understanding active materials comprising DNA molecules as well as enzymes that alter the topology of the DNA; use biochemistry techniques to prepare the materials, fluorescence microscopy to image the materials, and computational data analysis to characterize the material properties from the microscopy data.

Tamar Pinsky ‘26

NOAA: Fishery Management, Fisheries, Silver Spring, MD (onsite)

Conduct literature searches, interact with researchers both within and external to NOAA; synthesize written and oral information; edit various summaries provided to the office; and prepare a well-written initial draft of the findings.

Lainey Rendelman ‘26

U.S. Tennis Association, Orlando, FL (hybrid)

Work with the Collegiate Tennis department on a project-based schedule supporting the planning and execution of collegiate tennis tournaments at the USTA National Campus.

Thomas Robinson ‘25

NOAA: Advancing the Use of Drones to Support Assessment of Coastal Habitats, Beaufort, NC (remote)

Assist with processing and analyzing drone surveys of coastal habitats; perform data entry and management; and data analysis using quantitative approaches to conduct accuracy assessments, detect change in indicator metrics, and interpretation of outputs in the context of applied management and restoration.

Louis Rosenberg ‘25

Tomoyasu Lab at Miami University, Oxford, OH (onsite)

Dissect and document the wings of some mutant beetles, comparing them to those of wild-type beetles, and identifying phenotypic differences between them; keep a detailed laboratory notebook documenting experiments performed and results obtained each day; write a report summarizing results and present at a laboratory meeting.

Emil Sandberg ‘26

MediaLinks TV LLC, China Global Television Network (CGTN America), Washington, DC (onsite)

Perform research and fact-check; transcribe footage; assist on shoots; contribute story and show ideas; attend planning and creative meetings; and source images and footage.

Maxwell Schleien ‘26

Maryland State Archives, Annapolis, MD (onsite)

Work with the Assistant State Archivist to process new documents, scan, digitize, and organize records.

Keely Schrantz ‘26

Anne Arundel County Office of the State’s Attorney, Annapolis, MD (onsite)

Receive training in database management and office and courtroom procedures; read cases and police reports; attend court and meet with prosecutors after watching a case.

Bennett Scott ‘24

Electrophysiology of Experience, Memory, and Knowledge Lab, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL (onsite)

Learn laboratory techniques in a lab focused on understanding the neural mechanisms underlying the creation of memory and knowledge; assist with experiments; gain competency in general scientific research methodologies and familiarity with techniques in the field of neuroscience research; support the management of the animal colony and the construction of behavioral experiment equipment or apparatus.

Andrew Selway ‘24

Maryland Office of the Public Defender, Juvenile Justice Division, Baltimore, MD

Assist attorneys in preparing for cases and hearings in juvenile court, interview clients, and conduct research.

Jacob Sharpe ‘27

St. John’s College, Digital Publishing, Annapolis, MD

Proofread, edit, and typeset math and laboratory manuals to make them more readable and editable; learn to use LaTeX software program.

Harrison Suire ‘27

Episcopal School of Acadiana, Cade, LA

Act as a co-teacher for a high school travel course to Greece and Italy with components in both Louisiana and abroad. The course focuses on the impact of urban communities on the development of art, philosophy, and culture by investigating the history, physical location, and anthropologies of Classical Athens and Renaissance Florence.

Christopher Thomas ’24

St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology, Steubenville, OH (onsite)

Assist the Director of Events with planning and facilitating events that the St. Paul Center will attend and host; plan for the needs of the traveling bookstore at its various conferences; develop familiarity with their published works to represent them effectively; design promotion materials; set up and man the booth and bookstore.

Polina Vatralskaia ‘26

Astrakhan Museum-Reserve, Archeoterra Research Center, Astrakhan, Russia (onsite)

Participate in archaeological field work, surveys, and exploration; process materials; hold photo shoots; take inventory; and prepare materials for museum storage.

Jack Webb ‘26

Speech and Language Lab, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR

Introduction into the life of a Linguistics department and Speech and Language Lab; focus on the development of an independent research study that will also advance ongoing research in the lab; receive exposure to faculty outreach work; attend a course and weekly departmental colloquia as well as weekly lab meetings,

*Luke Widenhouse ‘25

Yorktown Institute, Washington, DC (onsite)

Work as a research intern at a think tank specializing in American national security and defense policy; assist with research on the defense budget and military force posture and modernization; analyze open-source information and disseminate it into reports; and help edit pieces for media outlets.

Amha Worku ‘27

Kana Television, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (onsite)

Work as a creative digital artist with the marketing and creative team; create digital content, graphic design, and multimedia production; work closely with the creative team participating in various projects which includes helping curate an exhibition at the gallery.

Juliann Yoder ‘25

University of Liverpool: Institute of Irish Studies, Liverpool, UK & University of Manchester: The Engine Room, Manchester, UK (onsite)

AJoin the team in Irish Studies to contribute to the planning and effective delivery of the annual International Samuel Beckett Festival which entails managing the audience experience, documenting the festival for archive and publicity purposes and lending practical assistance to the creative team; work in the Institute cataloging and archiving primary sources; work on a civic engagement program called The Engine Room.

Nathan Zewdie ‘27

Ultimate Plan, PLC, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia (onsite)

Gain exposure to architecture and engineering design and practice with a comprehensive understanding of the intricate interplay between architectural design, engineering principles and their profound influence on the built environment.

Henry Zheng ‘24

CAPAL (Conference of Asian Pacific Leadership), Washington, DC

Work on a variety of projects ranging from research, outreach, program management, communications, and administrative support.

Abhigya Adhikari ‘26

Creating Possibilities, Kathmandu & Dang, Nepal

In my role as a research intern, I had two weeks of the planning phase in Kathmandu. This is where my transport to Dang and the plan and itinerary for my stay in Dang was organized. Along with this, I had the opportunity to see the other projects that Creating Possibilities, Nepal had for the coming year. This is when I was able to talk to the director of the organization and my mentor about the history of the mother’s group in Dang and the progress thus far. As this exchange was candid and included a lot of the organization’s experiences that my mentor had experienced first-hand it was an irreplaceable part of my work coming up in Dang.

At Dang, I was confronted with two things that I don’t necessarily enjoy, heat and an odd diet. But it was my goal not to be difficult as I was eating with the other members of staff and if it was good enough for them, it was good enough for me. My first day there, they asked me if I preferred rice over bread with my meals and I, unaware of how the weather would affect my appetite, said rice. So, the members of staff also had rice with me that night and it was a bigger adjustment for them than it is for me. In the evenings, I would sometimes cook for them.

During the day, there would be a window of three hours where going outside to conduct interviews would be nearly impossible so we would try to finish most of the interviews in the morning before and maybe save one for the evening. And the interviews were where I truly saw the impact that we had talked about in the Kathmandu office. We visited women who were members and beneficiaries of the UNAKO Co-op Mother’s group. They had received low and no interest loans to start businesses or to help with their farm. Ranging from small restaurants to electronic stores, these women had left no stone unturned for ensuring their financial wellbeing.

Going to a great-books program had given me some distance from the harsh realities of the world and how the world works. I would say that working with mothers that refused to let their conditions define them showed me how limitless possibilities really are. Very similar to St. John’s where all the work of the college really happens in the classroom, all the work of the mothers’ group also happens in these meetings they have every week. In these meetings, mothers get together to discuss financial literacy, domestic abuse, children’s rights, and ways to shut down local breweries making their husbands alcoholics. These mothers and their financial literacy, that only came about later in life for them, where they only later realized how interests would affect them was a show of the power of solidarity and community in learning.

Along with the mothers teasing me for not being able to withstand the heat and the other members of staff letting me cook them a meal in the evenings or borrowing their motorbikes for a cruise around in the evening breeze, my time in Dang really did not feel like work and made me realize how important it is to truly be happy in what you are doing. I don’t know if their gratification was only momentary but a profession in which I would be able to be inspired by everyone around me like I was in Dang sounds more than pleasing.

In my impact study that I prepared for Creating Possibilities, I told them that there is no limitations to the kind of work UNAKO could do in the future. However, my input as a Johnnie was the importance of how shifting towards loans for education, from just business-related loans, and seeing my input being received so well made me realize that both my experiences with my Hodson internship have been in the social impact side and that it is my true calling.

Erin Allen ‘24

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC) Edgewater, MD

This summer I interned with the Spatial Ecology lab at SERC for ten weeks, where I participated in an existing multi-year research project studying how population distributions react to deforestation and extreme heat events. The lab has recently been working with local ground beetles, and for my small addition to the project I developed an experimental protocol to test the behaviorally preferred body temperature of different ground beetle species, after which I looked over previous ground temperature and beetle-capture data across SERC’s campus to see if these preferred body temperatures were a good predictor for beetle species distribution.

As daily work in the lab, I spent a lot of time collecting live insects from the forest, running insect behavioral tests in the lab, and helping with other projects both within the Spatial Ecology lab and with my fellow interns across many other research labs! In SERC’s robust summer internship program, every intern is placed into a different research laboratory according to your interests, and in addition to the experience gained by working within the lab itself, each intern conducts their own independent research project and presents their results at the end of the summer. SERC also provides weekly career development sessions about science writing and communication, scientific resume building, choosing a career path, and applying for grad school I found it to be a very supportive and incredibly rewarding program, and with the Hodson funding from St. John’s, they allowed me to slot right in!

I think one of the most valuable things about working with SERC is the opportunity to talk to many different people in all stages of their scientific careers from other interns, to lab technicians, to head technicians and principal investigators, and all of the other wonderful staff engaged in a sweeping array of ecological disciplines all in the same place. Compared with my previous summer experiences, I got to hear an incredible number of perspectives about the different scientific focuses that can drive you, the winding paths that a career can take, and what is available in the wider world. The huge diversity, volume, and enthusiasm of the researchers at SERC provide a dedicated community that really supports you if you have the chance to enter it!

I went into this summer knowing that I wanted to be an environmental research scientist, but not much else about the shape of it; I left having learned that I love working in a more structured team environment and feeling more confident about my options regarding the process of developing a research focus. For any St. John’s students interested in environmental science who want to get a broader perspective on the field, I think applying to SERC through the Hodson program is definitely worth your interest!

Semyon Andruschenko ‘26

Just Dilijan It! UWC Dilijan, Armenia

This summer, I interned as a camp counselor at UWC Dilijan in Armenia, working for a summer camp program called “Just Dilijan it!” Our team of approximately fifteen staff members led a diverse group of about thirty children from Armenia, Karabakh, Russia, the Middle East, and other parts of the world.

My responsibilities were focused on working directly with the campers, organizing activities, maintaining discipline, and ensuring their overall well-being. We engaged in a variety of activities including sports, games, and workshops designed to foster international understanding, empower young people as future leaders, and inspire positive change. My previous experience as a lab assistant at St. John's College provided some foundation for working as an educator, though interacting with a significantly younger age group (13-15 compared to 17-19) presented new and engaging challenges. While the work was tiring at times, especially the planning meetings after evening check-in, I enjoyed spending time outdoors and engaging in active play with the children.

The team was made up of professionals from the education industry, but since it was the inaugural year for this particular program, we encountered several unforeseen challenges and a general lack of established protocol. However, this allowed for creative problemsolving and adaptability. Additionally, I enjoyed opportunities to travel and explore Armenia, including visits to the local art museum in Dilijan, ancient churches, and monasteries. These experiences offered a unique window into Armenian culture and language.

This internship solidified my interest in working with young people and exposed me to the rewards and challenges of youth education. While I found the work rewarding, I also realized I am more drawn to program design and the theoretical side of education rather than solely implementing someone else's vision. I understand this desire aligns with future career aspirations and necessitates greater experience and expertise. I am deeply grateful for the funding and support provided by Career Development Office at St. John's College, Hodson Selection Committee and the Hodson Trust Foundation, which allowed me to participate in this invaluable experience.

Parth Sarthi Bajaj ’24

Johns Hopkins University, Bloomberg School of Public Health, METRC (Major Extremity Trauma Research Consortium) Baltimore, MD

During the summer of 2024, I was fortunate to work as a Data Intern at the Major Extremity Trauma Research Consortium (METRC) at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health, a role made possible by the Hodson Internship Grant. My primary assignment at METRC was to contribute to the clinical data management and analysis of a substantial clinical trial. This experience was an excellent opportunity to immerse myself in the intricate processes of clinical research while developing my skills in data analysis, which I find to be essential in today’ s data-hungry world.

Working alongside a team of clinicians, statisticians, and scientists, I was tasked with managing, cleaning, manipulating, and analyzing participant data. My tools of choice were Excel and RStudio software that I had some familiarity with but had not yet explored in depth. The complexity of the data and the precision required for analysis pushed me to learn more advanced techniques, and I was grateful to have the guidance of experienced METRC data scientists. This mentorship allowed me to expand my technical abilities significantly, enabling me to deliver accurate and actionable reports that could inform decision-making at various levels of the clinical trial.

The intense learning curve I encountered at METRC was made more manageable by the rigorous academic training I received at St. John’ s College. The program ’ s emphasis on thinking from first principles and logically building upon existing knowledge proved invaluable as I navigated the complexities of clinical data. My background in critical thinking and analysis also made me a more effective communicator and collaborator. I found myself better equipped to engage in meaningful dialogues with my colleagues, understand their perspectives, and contribute constructively to our shared goals.

One of the most rewarding aspects of my internship was the collaborative environment at METRC. I was surrounded by a diverse group of brilliant professionals who were not only experts in their fields but also deeply committed to my professional growth. They provided me with a balance of autonomy and support that I found particularly effective. I was encouraged to take ownership of my projects, conduct independent research, and seek out solutions on my own. Yet, I also knew that I had access to a wealth of knowledge and experience whenever I needed guidance. This approach not only helped me gain confidence in my abilities but also taught me the importance of being a proactive learner and problem solver.

By the end of the internship, I felt a deep sense of accomplishment. I had developed the confidence to contribute independently to METRC projects and had honed my ability to provide insightful analyses that could drive research outcomes. Moreover, the experience reinforced the value of collaboration, critical thinking, and continual learning qualities that I am eager to carry forward into my future endeavors.

While my time at METRC has convinced me that clinical research is not the career path I wish to pursue, I am immensely grateful for the skills and insights I gained. The experience has equipped me with a robust set of data analysis and research skills that are applicable to a wide range of fields. As I look ahead, I am confident that these skills will enable me to explore and excel in areas that align more closely with my interests.

For anyone aspiring to enter fields like empirical social sciences, I strongly advise dedicating time to developing robust data analysis skills. My experience at METRC has demonstrated that these skills are not only valuable but indispensable for making well-informed decisions and contributing meaningfully to any research-based endeavor. They have broadened my employability options, enabling me to explore a wider range of fields and confidently provide value through my technical expertise.

Isaac Boone ‘26

New Sapience

Annapolis, MD

Hosted by alumnus Bryant Cruse (A73) and Tom Loveland (A84)

For the past three months I have received training and assignments from my internship mentor Bryant Cruse. Bryant is the CEO of New Sapience and has been fully committed to its development for 20 years now. Last semester Bryant and CFO Tom Loveland came to St. John’s to discuss New Sapience and describe the sort of help they need. Their presentation was engaging and led to an interesting conversation about the limits and ethical concerns of artificial intelligence.

One of the alluring prospects of the internship was that both Bryant and Tom had attended St. John’s and wanted to employ St. John’s students. They believed our education enabled us to think critically about how concepts should be defined in a distinct way. I did find it helpful to consider the methods authors like Aristotle used when comparing and distinguishing different essences.

The NDA’s I signed restrict me from giving a clear description of the work I accomplished as an intern. After getting accustomed to the software and terminology used by New Sapience, I was tasked with adding associations to concepts that were already defined in the system. By adding these associations, the artificial intelligence could better distinguish the meaning of words and phrases to respond more intelligently to questions asked by the testers. There were many enjoyable conversations between the interns and our supervisors, where we would defend our application of certain associations and work through our uncertainties.

The work environment was challenging for me. This was my first remote employment, and I’ve come to appreciate many of the warnings about working out of the office. The flexibility of my hours and the fact that my workspace was the living room of my home shared by five others made it difficult to fully engage in my work. I underestimated the value of having a manager hovering around my workplace to keep me on task and remind me of their expectations. I’ve also become convinced that the “onboarding” stage of a job is most in need of the in-person workspace. Getting set up and acclimated with our tasks would’ve been more efficient if we were all in the same room.

I must give credit to Jeff Rozman (always referred to as JR) who became the manager of the interns after Bryant provided some initial training. JR struggled with us over Zoom to answer all our questions and provide feedback for our completed assignments. He was generous with his time and did a good job at communicating Bryant’s goals for the technology. The reliance on Zoom meetings does not seem avoidable, especially in the tech sector, so I’m glad I’ve been exposed to this challenge and have considered ways of addressing its flaws.

My employment at New Sapience was renewed at the end of my internship and I am now working part time. I’m excited to continue this opportunity and hope to contribute to the release of New Sapience’s first product “Companion Sapience”.

Laurali Breeden ‘25

Classic Learning Test (CLT)

Annapolis, MD

During my internship at CLT this summer I took on the role of a Human Resources Assistant, which quickly expanded into various business-related tasks as needed. I handled everything from onboarding new employees to invoicing schools for their test dates and I became the main contact for questions about the company’s policies and for schools to request completed vendor forms. The experience of having both these job responsibilities provided me with a wide-ranging understanding of the broader mechanics of a rapidly growing startup, rather than a mere glimpse into either business or human resources roles taken individually. My biggest accomplishments this summer include revising the company’s handbook, updating onboarding procedures, and organizing internal documentation of employees and contractors, along with gaining the trust and respect for myself that is required for handling two varying job titles as my roles grew. I worked closely with my mentor, Noah Tyler, who offered invaluable guidance and gave me an insider’s perspective on how startup companies like CLT succeed in a fast-paced economic environment, especially while the company is in such an astounding phase of growth.

One of the most rewarding aspects of the internship was seeing how my academic background encouraged me to flourish at CLT, not simply because it is a classically-minded company but also because St. John’s teaches its students how to work with and care for their peers like they are family. Learning how to effectively work with others and to not only value their contributions to the company, but also to prioritize their needs in writing new policies or revising old ones, are all unique skills that my education at St. John’s laid the foundation for.

I particularly appreciated the work environment at CLT because it reminded me so much of the class environment at St. John’s. The company fosters an atmosphere of collaboration and the culture is both supportive and flexible as employees are prepared for whatever comes next. The rapid growth, going from 35 to 44 full-time employees just throughout the course of my internship, goes to show how much change a company can experience in times of extreme growth and how adaptable the employees within that company must be. It should be noted, of course, that this startup environment comes with its challenges the fast pace can be overwhelming at times, and the level of change, while stimulating, means that job descriptions and daily tasks can be in flux. Despite the potential chaos this can cause, my colleagues during this internship were not only professional in their work but were also passionate about CLT’s mission: to reconnect knowledge and virtue by providing meaningful assessments and connections to seekers of truth, goodness, and beauty.

Looking back upon my internship with CLT and anticipating my continued work with them in the following academic year, I believe I have found the perfect environment to foster my growing love for Human Resources and for CLT’s mission. The sense of shared purpose at CLT is what drew me to the company and it is the reassurance that I need to continue my work there as I begin preparing for a career after graduation.

Balaram Briant ‘25

Department of Philosophy and Religion, Christopher Newport University

Newport News, VA

Balaram pictured with his mentor, Prof. Schweig

I interned as a research assistant under Professor Graham Schweig at the Department of Philosophy and Religion at Christopher Newport University in Newport News, Virginia, this summer. Professor Schweig is working on an upcoming publication for Columbia University Press, The Bhakti Sūtra: Nārada’s Concise Teachings On Divine Love. The book is an annotated translation of the Sanskrit text Nārada-bhakti-sūtra (hence NBhS), which consists in 84 aphorisms. Professor Schweig had already completed the translation prior to my coming onto the project, so my task was to assist with his annotations.

Historically, the text of NBhS comes to us anonymously, though it is clearly connected with the bhakti or devotional movements of rennaissance Hinduism. My work was mainly an exploration of intertextual connections between NBhS and other texts within the canon, and then the writing of detailed notes for Professor Schweig to draw on in writing his annotations. This necessitated a close reading of NBhS and a lot of searching through other Sanskrit texts to track the use of important terms, enabling a comparison of the use of concepts in NBhS with the texts which stand to it as sources. These sources, so far as we were able to gather, are primarily the Upaniṣads, Bhagavad-gītā, and Bhāgavata Purāṇa; the connection with this last text, which we were able to demonstrate from a direct quotation, places NBhS in or adjacent to the Bengali schools of Vaiṣṇavism which originated in the 15th and 16th centuries CE and which revere Bhāgavata Purāṇa as their principal scripture. This discovery brings us a little closer to being able to situate NBhS in its historical context. We were not able to determine with certainty whether the author of NBhS was aware of Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu, an influential text dealing with similar subject matter and dating to 1541. While it seems likely that NBhS is a more recent text due to the lack of manuscript attestation, the fact that it doesn’t reference Bhakti-rasāmṛtasindhu directly would seem to indicate either that the author was not a member of the Gauḍīya Vaiṣṇava tradition (in which Bhakti-rasāmṛta-sindhu is foundational) or that he was deliberately adopting an antiquated style to give his text the reputation of being older than it, in fact, is.

In order to do this research I had to build my own database of the relevant texts which would be searchable. I found several sites (most notably the Göttingen Register of Electronic Texts in Indian Languages, but also the Jiva Institute’s Grantha site for the more obscure Gauḍīya texts) from which I could download many Sanskrit texts. Other texts had to be transcribed from PDFs. Once I assembled this database locally I learned how to use GREP to search it, which is a handy skill. I found translations where available, and at other times, when the relevant passages I found through database queries were not available in translation, I had to translate them myself, which provided me an opportunity to hone my language ability. All of the resources I accumulated and learned how to use will, I believe, prove valuable in later study.

The education I’ve received at St. John’s was invaluable in preparing me for this sort of research. A huge part of what we do on the program is to read closely and track the progression of ideas across eras and movements of thought. In a literary culture like that of the Indian religious thought, these skills are indispensible, since texts are often anonymous and can only be positioned in their context by exactly such close reading and meticulous tracking of the way that ideas and terms evolve from one period to another. In many ways, then, this internship was a kind of experiment in applying these skills to an area of study in which, owing to a comparative lack of secondary sources, the answers cannot simply be looked up. Doing this sort of work confirmed me in my pre-existing plan of pursuing graduate study in the field of the philosophical and religious thought of India. The relationship I developed with Professor Schweig will also, I believe, prove helpful with graduate admissions, and through him I was also able to get in contact with several other scholars in the field with whom I hope to work in the future.

Since the internship consisted wholly in textual research, I was able to work remotely when necessary, as I did for a couple weeks in Michigan at the beginning of the internship and a couple weeks in Annapolis at the end. It was less hands-on than most internships. I was able, however, to spend three weeks in Norfolk, Virginia, in the middle of the internship, and while there I met with Professor Schweig in person a number of times and worked at the beautiful Christopher Newport University campus, making use of their library and reading rooms. Meeting Professor Schweig in person was a great way to get some personal mentorship and he was happy to give advice about applying to master’s and doctoral programs, which departments I should be considering, which professors to consider studying under, etc., in addition to the immediate work on NBhS; I came away from the internship feeling much more certain about my path forward in this field than I was before.

While I’m still unsure at this point about exactly what specific philosophers or theologians I want to focus on in later research, I have a much clearer idea of what this sort of research consists in, what its methods are, and how to go about it. Since I do intend on going into this field, all of that is helpful to me, and becoming more familiar with the field and which thinkers and works are important also makes it much easier for me to think about the question of what I want to focus on later. Overall, it was a great experience and one which I believe has provided me with both a glimpse of, and a path toward, the research I want to do as a doctoral candidate.

Karolina Butkute’25

Office of the Public Defender, Parental Defense Division, Maryland Baltimore, MD

This summer I had the privilege to intern at the Office of the Public Defender, in Baltimore City, in the division of Parental Defense. The internship I participated in was supervised by Heather Tierney, a defender at the office.

The internship lasted for eight weeks, during which I was entrusted to perform a plethora of the daily tasks that would be customary for a lawyer. The tasks included contacting clients either over text, call, or email, to remind them of their court dates, setting up meetings for the defender, and keeping up with clients' progress in such sectors as housing, rehabilitation, and visitations (with dependents). Throughout the internship, my familiarity with client interactions grew. As my communication skills developed, I was encouraged to engage in tasks of greater complexity, such as interviewing clients and their families.

Additionally, the internship consisted of getting familiarized with judicial writing. The judicial writings I was able to interact with throughout the internship were court orders, court briefings, the established “facts” of cases, medical records, CPS evaluations, etc. Despite the intimidating nature of these writings, it was surprisingly natural to engage with them. This is because I was already somewhat familiar with analyzing texts in an academic setting through my St. John's education. I was soon trusted to write summaries for the defender. To summarize text first and foremost, consisted of synthesizing claims, evaluating the merit of the claim, and considering if it lines up with the timeline for the events, as well as investigating the claims validity through cross referencing information.

The opportunity I was given to engage in the writing necessary in the field of law and the handson experience of client communication highlighted to me my preferences and natural strengths, which in turn gave me a clear picture of the tasks I liked and disliked within the field. This insight was crucial in informing my expectations when considering law as a career field. Despite my affinity in regard to tasks such as interviewing clients, communicating, and researching, I did not enjoy the public and official parts of the role of the defender, such as courtroom proceedings. Therefore, in the future if I decide to pursue law I shall be looking into the possibility of a career as a clerk, rather than a defender.

Delaney Costello ’25

Breakthrough Collaborative, Fort Worth

Fort Worth, TX

This summer, I worked as a teaching fellow for Breakthrough Collaborative in Fort Worth, Texas. Breakthrough is a nonprofit program that targets students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and provides them with rigorous teaching and personal connections for the summers before seventh, eighth, and ninth grade. Students build close bonds with their teachers, who are all in high school or college themselves, and students continue to receive academic support and college counseling throughout high school.

My main role this summer was teaching civics to rising seventh graders, but I was also responsible for building a culture that would get these students excited to come to school every day. This meant that every morning, all thirty teachers cheered for the students as their parents dropped them off, I spent breakfast and lunch connecting with them, and every day my students and I had to come up with a cheer to present in front of the whole program. All the while, I also worked hard to plan engaging lessons for my students that would inform them of the rights they had as American citizens and get them excited to participate in the democratic process. I taught them the ten amendments from the Bill of Rights, but we especially focused on freedom of speech and religion, as well as the rights of the accused and the right to bear arms. We studied at least a dozen Supreme Court cases and did many fun activities, like mock trials and mock elections, as well as creating a timeline of voting rights with sidewalk chalk and turning our classroom into a Civil Rights museum. While I enjoyed bonding with my fifteen students on a personal level, my favorite part of every day was the hour I had to teach them. I loved seeing their faces light up when they understood a concept or got a question right, and I loved watching them grow so much even over just a six-week program.

My St. John’s experience certainly influenced how I lead my classroom, in a way that the kids appreciated. Especially because we covered so many world issues my students were experiencing firsthand, I made whole class discussions a pivotal part of their learning experience. I encouraged my students to develop their conversational skills and participation the same way my tutors encouraged me in my classes. Following in the St. John’s tradition, I had my seventh graders read the Declaration of Independence and the Bill of Rights straight from the document, not filtered through any secondary source, and I was proud of their ability to make sense of it. They surprised themselves by their ability to read such difficult texts. I was grateful to be able to share some of my educational experience with them and pass it on to the next generation.

While I adored my students and they were my favorite part of my day, some things I struggled with this summer were work-life balance and student discipline. I logged at least 450 hours of work over two months, but I believe that number is much higher, considering I came home to do an additional hour or two of grading and lesson planning almost every night. The sheer amount of energy I put into this job every day was difficult, and there were times when I struggled to keep up with the workload. Additionally, when students failed to meet behavioral and academic

expectations, it was hard to motivate them to change, because there were no real consequences for their actions. The consequences they saw were minimal or easy to dismiss as a middle school student, so at times, I felt at a loss for how to make them care about my class. I found that I would continue to put my full effort into teaching anyway, and the students who cared would make the most of this experience. For those students who didn’t seem to care so much, I tried to get to know them better and encourage them, and I found that positive feedback could push them to be better. I learned that the “bad kids” just wanted to know that someone cared about them.

I benefited from having a large team of people as my support system. I had an instructional coach, a longtime teacher during the regular school year, who helped me find solutions for student concerns and oversaw my teaching to help me refine my communication and lesson plans. I also had many other great supervisors, who kept an eye on academics and our overall work culture.

This summer helped me explore my interest in teaching and realize that if I wanted to, I could become a great teacher. I see so many ways I could be better, but I also know that I love working with kids and this could be a career I could thrive in. I’m not certain that I want to pursue teaching straight out of St. John’s, but this summer has helped me realize that I want to work in the education field in some capacity. I may come back to Breakthrough next summer, or I may explore other programs working in education. I am grateful for the opportunity to make an impact in the lives of my students, and I hope to continue making a difference in all future work opportunities.

Sophia Derico ’26

Maryland State Archives, Conservation & Special Collections

Annapolis, MD

This summer I worked with the Conservation and Special Collections staff at the Maryland State Archives, assisting in the repair and rehousing of many collections and items. I developed new skills, learning about various conservation materials and tools to determine which would be best to apply to the needs of the collections. For the Gray Collection (MSA SC 1879), consisting largely of lists of debts and confiscated British property from the 1780’s, I used heat-set tissue to repair pieces that had torn or come apart. These documents were written in iron gall ink, notorious for its unfortunate tendency to oxidize and flake apart over time. In places where the author had used more ink, holes had appeared in the paper. Some of these were not of immediate concern, but any that compromised the structure or obscured the information of the record had to be treated.

While the ink had aged poorly, it fared far better than many of the volumes of government records I worked with which were suffering from extensive red rot. Red rot is the degradation of leather, which causes the material to turn into a fine red powder over time. These too needed treatment, although they could not be repaired. To prevent any further damage, and to make the books usable for patrons, these volumes had to be wrapped in Tyvek covers, taped, and relabeled. After which they could be handled without staining the hands of the reader or shedding large portions of binding. New labels also made these records more accessible, allowing them to be easily identified and retrieved even after the covers have worn away.

I also assisted in the humidification of documents, newspapers, and one particularly ill-treated photograph. This panoramic black and white photo of the 1967 Maryland Constitutional Convention (MSA SC 6247-2-6) had been stored for some time in a very tight roll and as a result could not be opened or viewed without risk of damage. In order to unfurl the material we built a humidification chamber using a large bin with wet techwipe wrapped in Tyvek and a plastic grate barrier. The exposure to moisture, without allowing water to directly contact the photo, improves its flexibility. After being placed in and taken out of the chamber repeatedly over the course of several days it was unrolled and let to dry under a wool cover. It could then be treated for cracks and creases with tissue and gelatin and stored properly in a folder.

But not all of the projects I worked on were focused around repair and storage. Most collections needed to be described, cataloged, and organized as well. For collections that were new or unprocessed, all of the material had to be read and arranged. An unprocessed box from the Magruder Collection (MSA SC 1247-1-23) containing over 130 items had no existing description and was housed in folders in no particular order. I read through all these documents, sheets of notes, newspaper clippings, and letters and wrote descriptions, organizing them based on categories related to their contents, and finally re-foldered the entire box. The documents were

then accounted for, easily accessible, and much more useful. This required quite a bit of research, piecing together information so as to get an overall picture of the relevance of the items in the collection. I ended up learning not only about the life and family members of Dr. Magruder but also of the contentious case of the Naval Academy’s attempt to acquire St. John’s College, the controversy surrounding the move of the Land Office from the original Hall of Records building, and the Ark and Dove Society, among many other things.

Another organizationally challenging project was centered around removing oversized maps from the basement storage in order to roll and relabel them. The vast majority were stored flat on shelving that was overcrowded, resulting in wasted space and crumpled edges that made the maps very difficult to find and use. Their former storage also made it almost impossible for them to be put back in any semblance of order after they were taken out to be viewed. I helped to amend this inefficient system by taking all the maps down and putting them in order by item number, rolling them in small groups, and then wrapping and labeling each roll. Once intermediate shelves were removed from the range much more space was available and the maps were easy to locate and return.

Studying history and working through difficult texts academically greatly aided in my pursuits at the archives, though perhaps my greatest asset was the interest in historical matters I possessed from the outset. I enjoyed being in an environment where I was able to work hands-on with the documents. Reading through ledgers, books, and newspapers from hundreds of years ago was fascinating, despite the sometimes monotonous task of cataloguing all of the information I gleaned. I especially enjoyed making repairs to older documents, and to certificates requested by patrons.

However, while this particular internship was a very valuable experience, it has not made me want to pursue library and archival studies much further, at least not with the end of making it my career. But this internship has allowed me to learn broadly about certain styles of work that I like and will seek out in the future. For instance, at the archives there was quite the variety in terms of projects. I was able to work on multiple assignments, bouncing back and forth between projects when convenient and making it so that I was never stuck working on the exact same task for too long. Also, whenever I had been instructed in the skills necessary to complete a task I was free to work largely independently, which is what I prefer.

This internship allowed me to develop my skills as a researcher, conservationist, and historian, while also giving me the opportunity to learn about the importance and complexities of the Archives. Working here I was able to explore historical sites and museums in Annapolis, as well as the many different departments within the Archives itself to get as much practical and educational experience as possible. I am incredibly grateful for getting to have worked alongside so many talented and knowledgeable people and to have been a part of their mission to preserve Maryland history.

Maya Dickerson ’26

St. John’s College, Greenfield Library

Annapolis, MD

This past summer I spent twelve weeks interning in the St. John’s College archives at the Greenfield Library here on campus. The focus of the internship was the St. John’s College History Collection, which includes a variety of written materials spanning from the charter of the college in the late 18th century to the present day. Materials in the collection ranged from letters to newspaper clippings to full class notebooks.

My goal during the internship was to reprocess the collection at the item level. This meant first looking through the collection to get a sense of what it contained and how it might need to be changed. After I was familiar with the contents, I made a processing plan detailing the ways I wanted to change the collection to make it more concise and intuitive for future researchers. For the majority of the internship period, I followed my processing plan, which involved both working with the materials in person and updating collection information on the archive software used by the college.

While most of the time I worked alone, I was supervised by Emily Connell, who is the manager of technical services at the Greenfield Library. I felt that Emily and I worked well together, and she was able to provide me with many valuable resources for information on the preservation and processing of archival collections. I worked primarily in the archives processing room of the library, and I enjoyed working alone and in a space I felt was my own. I found that it was easy to get into the rhythm of relabeling folders or entering data on the computer when I felt completely undistracted.

While I knew I may be interested in a career in historical preservation, this was my first time working with historical materials. There was something extra special about the fact that through this internship I was able to bring together history and St. John’s College, two things I love dearly. As a Johnnie I feel that I both had a better understanding of the materials I was working with and a particular interest in and familiarity with them that made me particularly qualified for the job. I am glad to say that I truly loved this experience and see myself continuing to pursue opportunities related to historical preservation in the future.

Tallis Estevez ‘24

City

of Annapolis, Planning & Zoning Department, Comprehensive Planning Division

Annapolis, MD

This past summer, I spent 3 months interning at the City of Annapolis, gaining first-hand experience in the field of Urban Planning. It was an eventful summer for the Comprehensive Planning department the 2040 Comprehensive Plan (essentially a long-term plan for how the city should change and grow to meet the demands of the next 16 years) was approved by the City Council and the draft Public Water Access Plan was sent out to the public for comments.

I attended City Council work sessions and meetings about the Comprehensive Plan and spent time reading and editing it for grammar. While reading the plan, I got the chance to compare my experience of Annapolis and my thoughts about some of the local issues I’ve experienced, such as the high price of rent and the traffic in the downtown area, with the data-based recommendations in the plan. Through this process, I was able to expand my conception of what Annapolis is beyond the historic downtown area as I learned of other areas

The Public Water Access Plan concerns creating more spaces to access the water throughout the city and improving currently existing ones. These are mostly street-end parks, although the proposed College Creek Connector trail on back-campus is a part of this plan. I helped do outreach for this draft plan, asking for comments from the public since an important part of the process of planning is hearing the input of the citizens. I left flyers and copies of the plan at various institutions around the city and handed out flyers for a meeting in a specific neighborhood. The Comprehensive Planning division even had a booth at a Community Event hosted at Truxtun Park. We also held two meetings about the plan, which were interesting opportunities to see the sorts of questions and attitudes with which people approach civic engagement.

Besides helping move along the planning process for the aforementioned plans, I also helped prepare resources to accompany staff reports for a few proposed pieces of legislation. For example, one proposed ordinance would have expanded the types of places where a daycare could be established, including churches. I found images of various churches in Annapolis to show the conditions of the sites whether they had enough parking and open space to construct a playground. This was meant to serve as a visual accompaniment to the staff’s recommendation for the City Council to approve or not approve this legislation.

I also attended various meetings throughout this internship. I could participate in meetings internal to our division or in brainstorming sessions. For most other meetings, such as those with hired consultants or even City Council meetings, I spent my time learning about the planning process by observing the conversation. Conversations with the other members of the Comprehensive Planning division, especially my supervisor, Eric Leshinsky, were crucial in helping me process my thoughts about various meetings.

My time at St. John’s prepared me well to be able to follow meetings about topics in which I had little to no expertise. I am very comfortable thinking on my feet, listening to others, immersed in a new topic. It also helped me with editing, noticing grammatical details and implications in text, having learned grammar through the trials of Ancient Greek. But most importantly, my time at St. John’s helped me with thinking about the normative aspects of urban planning, the part that asks "what is a good city?" instead of taking the city as it currently is for granted. The ideal city is a vision with which both Johnnies and planners struggle.

My experience interning for Annapolis’s Planning department, supercharged my interest in pursuing a career in planning or a related field. We spend all our time in places. The idea that these places can be made better, that we don’t have to take them as set in stone, that they can be made more hospitable, more beautiful for the people that live and move through them, is immensely appealing to me. I think Planning will remain relevant to my life.

Michael Fahey ‘27 Kezlo Group Vienna, VA

In the last few years I have been deeply interested in architecture both as a subject as well as a potential career to pursue in the future. But without actual practice in the field, or even much exposure to it throughout high school, it was hard for me to really get a read on whether this is something I would actually enjoy doing. Naturally, I was looking for a way to get hands-on experience and worked on finding a place to intern. Being at a college that doesn’t have any architecture programs, nor having any experience myself, I worried it’d be too difficult to secure an internship because of how technical the industry is. Luckily Ms. Cady and Ms. Dunn were able to connect me with Kezlo Group, a firm that has worked on many projects for this campus.

Over the summer I worked as a full-time intern at Kezlo Group. Because the firm operates completely virtually, with its team members across the entire country, I was provided a laptop and worked mostly from home. The first few days of the internship allowed me to get my bearings as I worked under my mentor to learn the basics of Revit, an architectural modeling software that is necessary to learn due to its standard use across all firms. I spent these first days measuring and modeling my house in Revit as a way to learn it through practice. I also attended frequent meetings between Kezlo members, in which I would see how the teams coordinated roles and planned out projects under deadlines, as well as meetings between Kezlo architects and engineers. At these meetings they would problem solve and compromise in order to make sure the buildings are nice spaces to be in, and also made to consider, ventilation, electricity, equipment, and building code.

Pretty soon into the internship I moved past shadowing and was assigned to a project, working on different tasks throughout the month of June. The project was a large-scale hospital renovation, and I was specifically assigned to working on a servery and Starbucks that was being added. At first, I was creating design plans for the interior of the Starbucks, making options for the colors and materials that would be used. I then moved on beyond the finishes and actually created a design for the Starbucks interior itself, presenting that design along with the color/material options to the rest of the team, which was both a fun and nerve-wracking experience. Near the end of June, I helped with putting together a presentation for the client, in which some of my own color/material designs ended up being used as possible options for the client (and I found out that the client ended up picking one of my designs!).

Once work was done on the Starbucks and servery, I started bouncing around different projects, which meant a lot of adapting on my part. There was definitely less consistency after the first project, but I ended up really enjoying that part of it. It made most weeks feel exciting and constantly interesting, and it allowed me to work with more people in the firm and get more insight into different aspects of the field. The only issue with this is that sometimes there would be days of downtime where there really wasn’t much to do. It was made up for with other periods where there was almost an overwhelming amount to do, but again I really did enjoy that part of the internship. The two projects I ended up spending the most time on were also

renovation projects, but completely different from the one I worked on. One of them was for St. John’s College, and I met with part of the team to measure out rooms in Pinkney Hall, and afterwards I ended up spending a lot of time modeling the bottom floor of Pickney into Revit. The other renovation project was at another college, but for that one I focused much more on setting up and formatting sheets/presentations to be shown to the clients.

Despite being a virtual firm, there was a strong sense of community within it. Every Monday the entire team, including myself, would meet to quickly discuss deadlines and updates, but then everyone would be asked a different question each week ranging from “what artist have you been listening to the most recently?” or more outlandish ones such as, “if you had a clone what are three things that you would make it do?” It allowed everyone to get to show a little bit of their personalities every week and was always fun to go through. Outside of that, Kezlo was incredibly welcoming and helpful. I learned so much from just my mentor alone, who would make extensive time each day to teach me a new thing or talk about her own anecdotes from architecture school or older firms she worked at. While I didn’t get to talk to everyone, the people I did talk to were all similarly kind and helpful, going through their own experiences with the field, advice for me if I do pursue it, or just new random things to teach me.

Overall, I really loved the time I spent working at Kezlo Group, and because of it I understand far more about architecture than I ever did and realize that it is definitely something I can see myself pursuing in the future. The only issue is that I was assured time and time again that Kezlo is also a fairly unconventional firm, not just because of it being virtual but also because of the greater emphasis on collaboration, whereas most firms are strongly dictated by one or few people. Despite that, I can still say for sure I always enjoyed the work itself, even if it was removed from the also fantastic work environment. Once the internship came to an end, I was told that Kezlo is more than happy to take me on again in the future, and if everything aligns, it’s very possible that next summer I’ll end up going right back.

Helen Felbek ‘25

DENEFF (German Business Initiative for Energy Efficiency) Berlin, Germany

The German Business Initiative for Energy Efficiency (DENEFF) is an organisation with over 250 member institutions advocating for ambitious energy efficiency policies, functioning as the connection between the market and politics.

This summer, I had the privilege of spending thirteen weeks at their office in Berlin. As a public policy intern in the team “Decarbonization of Industry” I was able to work on the energy and heat transition of the German industry in multiple different ways:

One component of my work consisted of supporting different projects such as WEIT (the acronym stands for “heat efficiency through industrial transformation”) in collaboration with Fraunhofer Institute for System and Innovation Research funded by the German Ministry for Economic Affairs and Climate Action. I worked on scheduling meetings, making PowerPoint presentations, writing communication material, translating texts, editing and proofreading reports, and managing data securely using DENEFF’s CRM-tool.

Political communication was another aspect of my work, and a skill I was glad to develop more fully. I was responsible for preparing mailings, including the monthly newsletter which is sent out to over 1,200 persons. Collaborating with the team and my mentor, I ensured accurate and high-quality content. I learned how to effectively address various stakeholders and convey the importance of our messages in a clear yet concise manner, enabling respective addressees to recognize the relevance of our work easily. I also participated in the crafting and editing of official statements and comments pertaining to the legislative process. I was able to aid in the writing of a statement connected to the discussion draft on a law to promote investments by investment funds in renewable energies and infrastructure proposed by the German Ministry of Finance as well as a general statement on the “federal funding program for energy and resource efficiency in the economy” by the German Ministry of Economic Affairs and Climate Action.

My mentor Dr. Tatjana Ruhl also tasked me with independent projects such as cataloging and ranking low-hanging fruits for energy efficiency as well as reorganizing the research and study archive. I was also able to conduct independent research on the high-level reports to the European commission and European Council authored by the two former Italian prime ministers Letta and Draghi. I presented this research at the end of my internship to an audience of interested colleagues.

One of the highlights of my time at DENEFF was the annual conference held in June. This conference united high-level political actors such as the general secretary of the social democratic party of Germany, business leaders from the energy efficiency sector and innovators in the climate transition, creating an event that left me energized and hopeful for the future.

Generally, I learned a lot about the climate sphere both on a German and European level by attending meetings as well as webinars and events, taking minutes, and reporting back to the

team. I wrote briefings on new studies and shared them with my colleagues so that they are up to date on the latest scientific developments in the sector. Through this work, I was able to gain insights into the work of major national and European actors in the filed such as Agora or RAP. In addition, I spent a lot of time researching topics surrounding energy efficiency and climate action in the industry (such as REPowerEU) as well as legal texts such as subsidy guidelines, laws, proposed bill as well as amendments. Particularly for this task, critical reading skills developed at St. John’s were helpful.

The team spirit at DENEFF was truly outstanding. Everyone, including the senior level professionals, were always willing to help, and after no time I felt like I belonged to the team. Generally, there was always care and concern for the professional development of everyone, including interns. It would be a pleasure to work in a work environment like at DENEFF again in the future.

The internship made me more confident in the belief that having a liberal arts education is an asset instead of a weakness (even in Germany, where there is no culture of liberal arts anymore). My time in Berlin helped me gain deeper insights into the political work in the climate space. From the diverse educational backgrounds of my colleagues, I also learned that there is not one path to a career in public policy and political advocacy.

With this year’s EU election and the perceived decline of social acceptance for sustainability measures and policies, working toward the dissemination of energy efficiency across the EU is very relevant, as energy efficiency is an incredibly important component of the sustainable economic development of countries. The transition can create employment, a more resilient and better (energy) infrastructure, and even economic growth, all while lowering carbon emissions. In an emotionally charged debate surrounding climate action and the alleged trade-off between protecting the climate and prosperity, I appreciated DENEFF’s non-partisan “data over dogma approach.”

Currently, DENEFF is mostly looking for interns, however, if new projects are funded there is the option to start as a project manager as an entry level opportunity. DENEFF is also offering traineeships.

I am grateful to for the time I was able to spend at DENEFF and I am thankful to Dr. Tatjana Ruhl and everyone at DENEFF for being so welcoming and encouraging and the Hodson internship program for funding this invaluable experience.

Elliot Feldman ’26

Kingsbridge Historical Society Archives Bronx, New York

The Kingsbridge Historical Society, where I worked as an intern, has existed since 1949 and has accumulated a lot of material throughout its existence, including a lot of genuinely interesting documents and artifacts. Unfortunately, we had no idea what we had, since it had been moldering in the attic of a local church for the past several decades; any order the collection might have had was upended by children or vandals who had rummaged through; and we had no manifest of any kind. This summer, the KHS acquired a disused architectural landmarkdesignated Edge Hill Church to serve as their headquarters and moved their archives there.

It was my job to put the archives in order. I sorted all the material into different categories to get an overview of the kinds of material we had mostly newspapers, brochures and advertisements, and books. I found out that we had some material of great local historical significance newspapers dating back to 1915, police blotters with daily records from as far back as 1861, and a lot of local mortgage deeds, to name just a few. I was taught how to use the open-source archive management program CollectiveAccess by associates of the KHS who work at a local museum, the Van Cortlandt House, and used that knowledge to create a database tailored specifically for our collection. I began the work of cataloguing every item we had, but since I knew that I wouldn’t be able to complete the task myself, especially not in the limited time of the summer, I taught other members of the KHS how to use the program, and wrote an extensive 30-page document to explain the software and my methodology in detail to anyone who might want to work on it in the future.

I found the work environment extremely congenial I was only responsible to my mentor, Mr. Dembowski, the President of the KHS, and I was given wide latitude to set up the database and arrange my work as I saw fit. He trusted me to know what would be best both for the system I was setting up and for my own work, letting me decide when to take breaks, to arrive at and leave the office, and refraining from micromanagement. I justified that trust and strove to organize my schedule efficiently and to avoid procrastinating. The time-management skills that I have learned at St. John’s came in very handy, since here too we are trusted to make many decisions about how best to organize our time. I had co-workers, people who volunteered at the KHS, but we did not interact very frequently, and the work was much more individual than collaborative, which suited me very well.

The work itself was satisfying. I enjoyed seeing the progress of our organizing, as we packed material into boxes, clearing up space. However, while I found some parts of the work to be highly engaging, such as creating a system to categorize the material we had and teaching it to volunteers, other parts (for example, cataloguing individual objects in the database) were quite tedious. I suspect that I would not have enjoyed the work as much as I did had I been doing it fulltime instead of three 8-hour days a week.

Considering these, I would like to duplicate the managerial latitude I was given, the flexible and manageable hours, the individual nature of my work, and the visibility of my progress in any future work. I might volunteer at the KHS again, but I will not be able to work there since they are an all-volunteer organization. I might return to the archival field, since I now have experience and contacts in it, and have a record of doing good work, but I’m not sure I would like to, and would prefer to continue investigating other fields that might share the good qualities of the job I had with less of the tedium.

Gabriela Forte ’27

Maryland Office of

the

Public Defender—Harford County District and Circuit Courts Bel Air, MD

At my internship at the Maryland Office of the Public Defender in Harford County, Maryland, I was assigned a variety of tasks. The responsibilities of interns were, in a general sense, to assist wherever needed. I took full advantage of this to try and contribute in any way I could. During my time at the District Court office (where I worked for two months out of the three months I was interning), I started off reading discovery and calling clients. I would also frequently watch court proceedings in District Court, Youth Court, and Circuit Court, which gave me a much better understanding of the judicial and criminal justice systems.

As I gained experience in the office, I learned how to file documents both in online databases (such as eDefender) and through the office’s hard copy filing system. Attorneys began entrusting me to write memos, motions sub curia, motions to quash warrants, expungement requests, and bail review requests. These motions were reviewed after completion, and due to my work, an out-of-state client was able to have his warrant recalled. Another task that I had as an intern was to function as an informal interpreter for attorneys with Spanish-speaking clients, assisting in initial phone calls and client interviews/communications at the Harford County Detention Center. Due to my Spanishlanguage skills, I was even assigned to help communicate with a client on a case that is currently receiving national news attention.

Interns were also tasked with the completion of two service projects for the duration of the program. Our office decided to make a know-your-rights pamphlet to distribute to the community and to organize a professional clothing drive to get court-appropriate attire for our defendants. I was assigned to lead the way on the pamphlet project, so I maintained communication with the other interns, collected their work, and compiled it into a pamphlet that we then distributed to local buildings such as the public libraries and local YMCAs. I even translated the pamphlet into Spanish for non-English-speaking members of the community. When working on the clothing drive, I organized and logged all the professional clothing we already had in our storage for clients, creating a spreadsheet with a size-lookup system to make finding clothing for defendants more efficient. The office interns then made flyers and collected boxes, which we then brought to local libraries to collect donations until mid-August.

I felt that the greatest benefit I had during this internship, the thing that I believe helped me achieve all that I did, was the discipline and critical thought that I have developed as a St. John’s student. The St. John’s model helped prepare me for complex concepts and a heavy workload, as well as the independence and desire to learn that were integral to this internship. Because of these skills that have been cultivated in me by the St. John’s program, I was able to be a self-

starter, always seeking new projects and ways to help, eager to learn more and contribute more in any way that was useful. I was able to have a more thoughtful eye when it came to simpler things like discovery review and was also able to better appreciate the complexities of the legal system and the concept of justice. As a Johnnie, I am not afraid of hard work, and this was a great asset in demonstrating my capabilities in the office. My greatest priority was assisting in any way I could, and the motivation and curiosity within me as a St. John’s student made the experience incredibly interesting and fulfilling.

Part of what I loved about working at the OPD was the people. The work environment at the office was so welcoming. The attorneys are friendly, intelligent, and interesting people with a real care for their community. I learned so much from them about the legal system, from administrative tasks to trial work. I also enjoyed getting to know my fellow interns. My least favorite thing about the office, however, was how hard it was at times to get extra things to do. I am a naturally quick worker, so oftentimes I was left with free time after finishing my tasks for the day. The attorneys are incredibly busy, meaning that it is hard to catch them between tasks to ask for more work to do. I was quite active in keeping busy, volunteering for things, and asking for opportunities to help, but it was not always easy to be busy all day. I do believe that this is simply because the office is undermanned and overworked, so it is hard to organize an intern program on top of everything else. While this was not ideal, it was very manageable, and I took the initiative to keep busy and help where I could.

I always knew that if I were to become an attorney, I would want to work in public defense, because I knew I was interested in criminal law and that I found public defense work to be very admirable. I still believe that, but I think it has also helped me better understand what the career entails. After watching dozens upon dozens of cases, it made me realize that there are certain felony cases that I would be quite uncomfortable taking. I still hold the belief that every defendant is entitled to legal representation, but it made me question if I would be more interested in specific non-profit work as opposed to taking whatever cases are assigned to me. It has been a remarkably interesting moral exploration to be working here, and I feel that I have learned a lot both about myself and the world around me. I chose this internship to figure out if I would like law enough to work in this field, or if academia would be a better direction. I am still not completely sure on which direction I may take, but this program has certainly confirmed my interest in public defense should I go on the law track.

I would like to work in a similar environment to this office in the future; the fact that the people that work there are all friendly with one another, the fact that it is bustling, the fact that it is work for an important cause, are all very important to me. I look forward to developing in my career and qualifications to have a more active role at a place like the OPD. This office or another office in Maryland is in the cards for me when it comes to my future. I am also interested in exploring the Decarceration Initiative in Baltimore, or seeing what an internship at the ACLU entails, because I do have a heavy interest in other forms of advocacy and involving a more comprehensive writing and research component into my future work.

Overall, my work at the Office of the Public Defender has been incredibly illuminating and educational, and I have been so grateful for the experience. This was a fantastic opportunity to explore a career field before making the decision to go to law school or not, and it was so rewarding and meaningful to contribute to my community, especially to those who need it most.

Georgia Galardi-Pittard ‘25

Green Tree Mind Denver, CO

This summer I worked with Dr. Renee Ostertag and Dr. Robyn Gisbert, two psycho/physical therapists. The two of them have created a practice where they specialize in psychosomatic therapy, in other words, they are interested in treating the whole human, not just their symptoms. What was originally a curiosity and interest of mine, has developed into a desire to continue in this field.

My activities ranged from editing videos, brainstorming video scripts, arranging presentations, attending lectures at the CU Boulder Medical Campus, and meeting one-onone with my mentors. Most notably, I assisted Dr. Ostertag with the production of her Project Om course. Project Om is a dynamic educational initiative akin to Masterclass, designed to provide users with expert-led courses. My contributions to this project were multifaceted and involved several key tasks: video editing, script writing, and graphic design. During the production, we worked closely as I acted as her guinea pig and soundboard. In addition to the hands-on work that I did, I read many books to supplement my discussions with my mentors and be of further help with projects. Here are just a few of the books that I read:

“More Than Words” - John Howard, “Polyvagal Exercises for Safety and Connection” - Deb Dana, “A Game Free Life” - Stephen Carpman, “Nonviolent Communication” - Marshall Rosenberg, “Living Nonviolent Communication” - Marshall Rosenberg, “Permission To Feel”Marc Brackett, “On Grief and Grieving” - David Kessler, “The End of Trauma” George Bonanno, “Atlas of The Heart” Brene Brown, “The Power of Attachment” - Diane Poole Heller.

My time at St. John's emphasized the importance of critical thinking and analysis. These skills proved invaluable in my work with the psycho/physical therapists. For example, when discussing whether the creation of some therapeutic tools would be more helpful or harmful. Additionally, by closely examining and interpreting course materials for Project Om, I was able to contribute to well-crafted scripts that were clear, engaging, and informative. Most significantly, the relationships that I have developed with tutors were incredibly helpful in understanding the dynamic that I desired between me and my mentors. My mentors and I approached the ‘curriculum’ with curiosity and mutual interest. The relationships that I developed with them have significantly influenced my desire to continue in a similar field to them. At this moment, I am unsure what the next steps are in continuing on this path. This fall I hope to have further discussions with Dr. Ostertag and Dr. Gisbert to brainstorm further education!

Catherine E. Greer ’25

Stan Hywet Hall and Gardens

Akron, OH

I spent my summer working as a collections intern at Stan Hywet Hall and Gardens, a historic Tudor-style manor home in Akron, OH. The history of Stan Hywet is deeply tied to the growth and community of Akron, the city in which I grew up, and so my interest in this internship was fueled both by a desire to gain experience in a museum environment and learn about the history of my hometown.

As a collections intern, my main responsibilities consisted in helping to preserve, organize, and document the many different historic objects in the museum’s collection including antiques, textiles, works of art, and architectural elements. In addition to learning how to properly clean, move, and store historic objects, I also learned how to properly document each object according to museum digital archive procedures. Some of the more specific projects that I was involved with were routine cleaning, pest control, disaster response, photographing and recording damaged objects, and creating new digital records. The largest project that I worked on individually was to entirely reorganize the museum’s collection of 5000+ antique books, re-configuring how they were stored while photographing each book, recording inscriptions, and updating all of their digital records.

This internship was a continuation of previous museum work that I have done through the Hodson grant program, so I was able to begin with a higher level of independence and responsibility at Stan Hywet due to this prior knowledge and experience. My work at St. John’s, though of a very different nature from my museum and archival work, was invaluable in helping me to connect well with my mentor and co-workers and feel comfortable and confident in problem-solving my way through difficult tasks. My mentor was grateful for my ability to always ask the right questions and never feel afraid to ask for assistance or clarification, a quality which helped me to do things solidly and rightly the first time and which I am sure is a result of my education at St. John’s. In my work I always had opportunities to pursue my curiosity, learning more about decorative arts, medieval-era antiques and architecture, and especially to pursue my growing interest in textile arts through the extensive tapestry and drapery collection, and I was grateful to spend my time in such a beautiful old home that, like St. John’s, encouraged a desire to be constantly learning.

The work environment itself was relaxed and stress-free; unlike more traditional fine arts museums which center around a continuous cycle of large and complicated projects, historic house museums are focused on preserving their buildings and what they have in their collection as a result the work is more reactionary and focused on slow projects that last for many years. In many ways I appreciated this easy environment, and my co-workers were lovely and always excited to share their work with me; I found that I had a lot of time to learn about the museum and interact with everyone involved in its upkeep while still completing my responsibilities. However, in the future I would prefer to return to a more forward-looking art institution some of my work I found more slow and repetitive than I would prefer. Regardless, it was an excellent environment for me to grow confident in object-handling and archival procedures and it provided me with a high level of independence, and the experience itself will be extremely beneficial for my future. Though my collections work at Stan Hywet was less my final goal and more of a stepping stone into more specialized art-related fields like conservation, I have made good connections that I know will serve me well for recommendations and referrals when I am ready to move on in my career.

Mia Rose Guill ’27

Virginia Holocaust Museum Richmond, VA

I had two distinct jobs during the course of my internship at the Virginia Holocaust Museum (VHM). At the beginning and the very end of my internship I worked with my mentor and other museum staff to create two calendars: one containing important dates in Holocaust education and remembrance and the other listing the birthdays of Holocaust survivors whose testimonies the museum had in their collections. Following this I created a document of the stories and pictures of these survivors so that the museum could post relevant stories on social media or use them for other programming according to the dates on the calendar.

My other job at the VHM was helping with the museum’s Teacher Education Institute (TEI). There were two sessions of TEI, June 24-26 and July 15-17. The TEI is one of the museum’s biggest events of the year, hosting teachers from all over Virginia and North Carolina and holding classes on the Holocaust, workshops on Holocaust teaching methods, and even having Holocaust survivors speaking to the teachers. My mentor oversees these workshops, so during the classes and the weeks surrounding them I helped her to prepare for the classes and ensure that they ran smoothly, arranging paperwork and handouts in folders for the teachers, setting up breakfast and lunch, and cleaning up when needed. When my help was not needed during the workshop I was permitted to sit in on the classes.

This internship gave me a good view of the field that I hope to go into in the future and allowed me to think about my future goals with the context given by working in a museum. I got to talk to the museum’s Director of Collections which inspired an interest in archival work. Before my internship I had hoped to work as a curator eventually, and I am still interested in curatorial jobs, however next year, I hope to have an internship in collections, either at the Virginia Holocaust Museum or somewhere new, to further explore archival work and figure out if it might be more in line with my interests. It would be useful to decide whether I want to pursue a career in curatorship or archival work early, as they require very different graduate degrees. I really enjoyed the laid-back atmosphere of the museum, as a smaller museum there was a lot more freedom to explore other departments and really observe the functioning of the museum.

The downside of a smaller museum, as a newcomer, though, was that I did feel a little disconnected from my coworkers occasionally because the environment of the VHM was very tight-knit and the people there already knew each other very well because there was such a small staff. Because of this, as well as my natural tendency to be reserved and have trouble asking for help, I really needed to rely on what I have learned at St. John’s to be bolder in asking my colleagues questions about the field and learn more about museums. I think a small museum would be very nice to work at long-term, though, as it allows you to really know your colleagues and, as I observed as Mrs. Ferenczy’s intern, it is very useful to be able to just walk down the hall and discuss problems with people directly. Therefore, in my future employment I might seek out another small museum.

Henry Haggard ’27

American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia Richmond, VA

During my internship with the ACLU of Virginia, I was asked to do a wide variety of tasks. For starters, I took notes during meetings for the Organizing Team, the Reproductive Freedom Team, and the K-12 LBGT Team. Since all their meetings are held in the form of dialogues, there must be someone writing down the ideas and questions that arise during the discussion. I also input volunteer data into the ACLU-VA's contact software so we could reach out to them with volunteer opportunities.

These were my more boiler-plate internship responsibilities, but on top of these I carried out three major research projects. The first was about a prison reform bill that expanded good-time credit opportunities for inmates to earn time off of their sentence. The ACLU-VA has argued four court cases (three of which they won) to make sure this policy was fully implemented, and my supervisor asked me to write a memo so that the employees who weren’t involved in the litigation could get themselves up to speed. I spent hours poring through microfilm, Supreme Court Reporters, Lexis-Nexis Legal Library entries, FOIA requests, and Code of Virginia documents dating back to 1940. But after reading dense program texts like The Peloponnesian War, this research was a breeze. All this culminated in a four-page policy memo which could serve as a starting point for other ACLU state affiliates who want to follow in our footsteps. As I wrote this memo, I realized just how much the Johnnie writing style helped me. After writing my freshman essay, I am confident I can 1) navigate through difficult and nuanced topics, 2) explain my reasoning in an engaging and precise manner.

My second research project was much simpler, but no less important. I created and maintained a document keeping track of certain school board candidates’ positions on book ban and trans student policies. This helped the team create a more informed campaign plan for the school board elections the goal being to elect members who support trans students and oppose book bans. And in my third and final project, I reached out to minority law student organizations and their local chapters many of which took some digging to find to help the ACLU-VA grow a more diverse intern applicant base for future summers.

But my favorite part of my internship by far was the two hearings I was fortunate enough to attend. The first was in York County, which we lost on technical grounds, and the second was in a Richmond Federal Court, which we won! Both cases were about transgender students’ access to public school sports teams aligning with their gender identity. It was a great experience for me to see the inside of the court room and the inner workings of the justice system.

This summer my commitment to working at a nonprofit strengthened, but I realized I no longer want to be a lawyer. I am not built to spend every day indoors, especially if I’m at home working on Zoom. Nevertheless, I’m confident that the ACLU-VA would be a great place to work in the future if I decide that I prefer working somewhere with air conditioning!

The people I worked with made my internship as great as it was. Everyone was willing to help me and answer any questions I had. Like St. John’s, so much of the ACLU is based on dialogue and discussion, and every employee and intern have a seat at the table and must listen and contribute with care, just like in seminar. My time at this college taught me how to speak clearly, ask the right questions, and navigate the justice system in a way that I hope would make Plato or Aristotle proud. All in all, I never felt like an intern at the ACLU-VA I felt like an apprentice.

Deidre Hansen ’27

Salida Regional Library Salida, CO

I spent this summer working as an intern at my hometown library. I knew when I applied to St. John’s that I was interested in Archival Sciences, and part of the reason I chose the Annapolis campus was because I anticipated that I would have wider access to archival positions in the D.C. area. Therefore, it felt slightly ironic that my first archival job was less than a five-minute drive from my childhood home in rural Colorado. In many ways, however, this opportunity was a dream come true. I love my childhood library, in fact, I could even say that it was one of the major reasons I ended up at a college like St. John’s.

My internship consisted of work as both a circulation librarian and an archivist. This was the best of both worlds, as I had the opportunity to work with the public and to work in conjunction with my archival supervisor to complete focused archival projects. I cataloged and digitized photo negatives from the 1930s, humidified and pressed historic images that had become brittle and curled, and organized and cataloged a large collection of documents that had been donated to the library.

The Ethel Purdom Collection is a wide assortment of photos, newspaper clippings, and newspaper article proofs that Mrs. Purdom collected over the course of her many years of service at a local newspaper. Her collection includes many items that pertain to Salida’s early history and will prove extremely valuable to anyone hoping to learn more about the stories of early people and places in this historic community. It was truly an honor for me to explore her collection and to make it more accessible to future researchers.

I loved many aspects of this internship, i.e., learning about the people who lived in this area 150 years ago, working with many amazing people, and the accomplishment I felt when I completed a large project. However, in my opinion, the most valuable part of the internship was learning what I do not enjoy about the kind of archival work I was tasked with. I had suspected prior to the internship that I would most enjoy a role which involved some degree of hand skills, i.e. working as a conservator or restorer. This experience solidified that for me. I loved being able to look at a place I’ve known my whole life with fresh eyes. But I often wished that I could spend more time doing tasks which required less typing and looking at a computer screen, and more physical skill. Because of that, while I’m still considering working in the archival field, I am also considering career opportunities in textile conservation or a similar field.

This experience also helped me to find balance between the completely self-determined employment style I grew up with (self-employed artist parents), and the more authoritarian supervising of my early bosses. I thoroughly enjoyed having some structure and clear requirements, while also having the freedom to determine the places I would be most useful. I believe this also allowed me to develop closer, more independent relationships with my coworkers. I hope to find future roles with a similar style of leadership.

While I’m unsure if this particular type of archival work is for me in the long-term, I feel extremely fortunate to have been offered future employment in a similar role at the conclusion of my internship. I have certainly learned a huge amount from everyone that I’ve worked with here and hope to continue those relationships even while in Annapolis.

Rachel Hauben ‘25

Nuclear Ship Savannah Services

Baltimore, MD

Hosted by alumnus Tom Osborne (A02)

This summer I had the incredible opportunity to work as a technical writing intern onboard the Nuclear Ship Savannah. The Savannah is a registered National Historic Landmark, the only (formerly) nuclear-powered cargo and passenger vessel in the world. I am incredibly grateful to have had Tom Osborne (SJC Class of ’02) as my mentor. With his guidance, I familiarized myself with the technical writing style implemented by the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission by studying and creating revisions of procedural documents. I absolutely adored my time onboard the Savannah and have gained invaluable experiences which I believe will remain with me well into the future.

During my internship I was proud to submit 11 revised procedures spanning operating instructions, inspections, and even administrative documents for approval and future use. In working on maritime, radiological, and administrative documents, I gained an abundance of knowledge about a vast variety of topics I never would have had the opportunity to engage with before. For instance, when else would I have been able to learn about the operation and inspection of capstans or emergency egress ladders, let alone to become familiar with radiological terminology? I am extremely grateful to my coworkers for always being willing to go through the details of any machinery I lacked the practical knowledge of. Speaking with the people performing the procedures I was revising made it so much easier to make my revisions correspond with the actual work being done in the field. After all, one of the primary purposes of technical writing is to ensure the accurate and controlled communication of information. Through major rewrites, small typographical corrections, and everything in between, I am honored to have contributed to making the Savannah run smoothly as the rest of the decommissioning process progresses.

In addition to procedure revisions, I aided in the completion of various other tasks. One of these was a major overhaul and update of the system for technical instructions posted around the vessel. Originally, such postings were entirely controlled and recorded in a logbook, but the system had been long neglected and “controlled” postings were now out of control. I was happy to create a new logbook with records of every posted technical instruction both past & present, remove unnecessary postings, and create new postings for those which were still necessary yet out of date. Additionally, I made slight revisions to the procedure controlling such postings in the hope that the system will persist in its newly organized state. As I revised procedures, drafted a new logbook, and updated postings, I learned a great deal about advanced Word functions. I have no doubt that such knowledge will prove to be invaluable wherever my career takes me.

As a National Historic Landmark, the Savannah played host to multiple tour groups throughout the summer. I was lucky enough to act as tour guide to members of the Nuclear Regulatory Commission Legal Department, the Junior Military Attaché School, and even the general public. I absolutely adored working on a ship that had been so well preserved and restored since its launch in 1959. It was wonderful to show tour groups the original 1961 RadaRange microwave oven, to bring to life stories of the ship’s time at sea, and simply to share with them the historic site I came to adore so much.

Overall, my immense appreciation for the lessons we can learn by looking back on the past blended with my enjoyment of vintage fashion and storytelling to make every day feel like a bridge between the ship’s past, present, and future. Overall, I felt so fulfilled with the work I was doing onboard the Savannah. It was reassuring to feel good about the quality of work I was producing individually, and to know and see how I am actively helping with the larger project at hand. I am honestly and seriously considering pursuing a career in technical writing upon graduation. I believe very strongly in the power of the written word. If we have any desire to collaborate with others and feel as though what we do really means something, it is imperative for our communication with one another to be as clear as possible. Technical writing not only allows for that clarity, but it makes clarity a necessity. Some of my favorite days on the job were spent scouring documents to ensure that every single word, comma, and space was in its proper place. Even a year ago, I never would have thought that technical writing would be something I could pursue. Now, though, I recognize that my detail-oriented nature, love of editing, and overall desire to cultivate communication and collaboration in any environment I find myself in are key strengths for a technical writer. Having Mr. Osborne and several of my co-workers comment frequently on my natural aptitude as a technical writer and editor confirmed for me that my steadily growing inclination to pursue technical writing as a career does indeed have a solid foundation. Combining the skills I already had with those that I have developed through this experience, I so look forward to seeing where this pursuit takes me!

Though I adored my experience onboard the Savannah, the nature of the decommissioning process means that I cannot count on finding employment with Nuclear Ship Savannah Services (NSSS). Still, nearly all of my co-workers have volunteered to give me a recommendation as I pursue future work. Perhaps I may even find a job with one of the organizations currently involved with NSSS, such as Radiation Safety and Control Services or even the U.S. Department of Transportation Maritime Administration.

Wherever I may end up, I am incredibly grateful to have had the unique opportunity of working onboard a nuclear-powered vessel from the 1960s, to have made meaningful connections with my mentor and co-workers, and to have gained confidence in myself as I move toward my new goal: to pursue a career in technical writing.

Zeinep Ibragim Kyzy ‘24

SADA Consulting Prague, Czech Republic

During my internship, I had the opportunity to work on a variety of tasks, including proofreading and researching immigration law documents, which aligned perfectly with my initial goals. Working in an immigration law firm allowed me to engage with a diverse range of people facing complex challenges, from undocumented families stranded in the Czech Republic to Ukrainian refugees seeking a fresh start.

What I hadn't anticipated was the additional experience I would gain working at the honorary Kyrgyz consulate in Prague and with a hiring company, AMADI, both of which are connected to the primary firm, SADA Consulting. When my mentor was unavailable for immigration law work, I took on roles as an events manager and researcher for the consulate, and contributed to the PR team at AMADI.

One of my key responsibilities included conducting research for the Kyrgyz ambassador in preparation for high-level meetings with the ambassadors of Russia and China. I also authored a detailed political analysis on Kyrgyzstan’s diplomatic relations, which significantly enhanced my research skills skills I believe will be invaluable as I advance in my career. Additionally, on weekends, I organized cultural events that celebrated Kyrgyz heritage and helped to connect Kyrgyz workers and students abroad. These events introduced me to a wide range of fascinating individuals, sparking my interest in new subjects.

My academic background from St. John’s College proved extremely useful, especially in writing and analyzing large volumes of information. I synthesized complex immigration law material into digestible formats for presentations my mentor gave. The texts we explored at St. John’s, many of which touch on core global issues, allowed me to connect with my colleagues both intellectually and politically.

Following the internship, I decided to relocate to Prague and continue my studies at Charles University, where I’ll be focusing on Public and Social Policy. This decision stemmed from the realization that I’m more drawn to policy research than to directly practicing law. While I found client interaction rewarding, I discovered that my strengths lie in research and working with texts.

Though I enjoyed my time at AMADI, I realized that working remotely, with my mentor being less accessible, required me to be more independent, often answering my own questions. The collaborative dynamic with my colleagues, who were mostly assigned non-legal tasks, was more casual and friendly, which I appreciated. However, I think I would thrive in a work environment where I could relate more closely to my peers and have better access to guidance.

Given my appreciation for the multicultural environment (Kyrgyz, Czech, Russian, Ukrainian) at AMADI, I’ve agreed to continue assisting with diplomacy-related projects in the future. I plan to occasionally stop by the office to help out while pursuing my studies at Charles University.

Ibrahim Ibrahim Ismail ‘25

Presidential Initiative for Innovation, Policy Evaluation and Research (PIIPER)

Abuja, FCT, Nigeria

I spent this past summer in Abuja, the federal capital of my home country working as an analyst for the Senior Special Assistant to the President of Nigeria on initiatives to promote research and development, innovation clusters, and accelerating innovationdriven enterprises through the Presidential Initiative for Innovation, Policy Evaluation, and Research (PIIPER).

My initial set of responsibilities involved conducting a variety of data science related studies in comparing first and third world country statistics. This experience taught me the value of research from the very beginning of my internship, how it shapes development methods, and how crucial it is to interact empirically with both public and private organizations. Through this experience, I was able to collaborate with other interns on team activities to comprehend the need of performing research for complicated organizations. I worked on this component of my internship for approximately a month, and I came away with a general understanding of the procedures and methodology involved in obtaining, organizing, and making sense of enormous datasets for African nations.

In addition, my mentor engaged me early on in attending a high-level meeting with leadership of the Mastercard Centre for Inclusive Growth, a philanthropic arm of the global payment’s corporation, that seeks to advance innovation and social impact in the developing world. I was able to partake in this high-powered delegation through what I've become much acclimated to over the course of my three years at St. John’s are the essential skills of good questioning and active listening in conversation. Furthermore, I was also charged with providing a brief to Nigeria's Vice President on PIIPER-related activities, this was perhaps the most daunting task of my internship, as I had to simultaneously incorporate elements of an oral and don rag within the brief. Overall, both these meetings enabled me to learn the hierarchical roles and importance of leadership-driven discussion for reform within organizations.

Another interest that my internship allowed me to pursue was collaborating with a friend to cofound Horizun, an educational technology startup. This was achieved through the PIIPER Fund, which is designed to ensure focus on sustainability and impact through strategic investments and partnerships. Horizun is a desktop-virtual reality careers simulation that aims to give an immersive platform for international graduates and job seekers to find future opportunities in any career fields. My personal impetus for Horizun began in the spring, when I started considering life after St. John's, believing that students like myself, would require some sort of platform to assist them in navigating the challenging climes of post-college life. We were privileged to pitch Horizun and be advised and provided with an accelerated-learning method by my mentor, who provided guidance on entrepreneurship, leadership, and innovation principles required for Horizun to succeed from early-stage ideation to market.

Overall, my work this summer from PIIPER to Horizun has been undoubtedly an exciting and wonderful experience. I am grateful for the opportunity the Hodson internship provided me with this summer to explore both these fields and my interests in them.

Naeun Jang ’27

EQUALKEY & Quebon Company Seoul, South Korea

As a summer intern, I had the opportunity to work at Quebon Company part of EQUALKEY a company that provides math education for children. I got to know about this company through YouTube and was fascinated by the approach they take in their curriculum because it was very different from how we were taught in school. They focus on reminding of the importance of intuition and creativity in solving math problems, and refuse to teach mathematics in a conventional way, which puts a lot of emphasis on memorization.

Quebon Company’s approach to mathematics reminded me of Plato’s Meno, which to me, was a book that reminded me of the importance of asking questions, and I was surprised to see how Quebon Company used similar methods of asking questions to solve math problems. This assured me that this would be a good opportunity to better improve my skills in mathematical thinking and better understand my aptitude.

My main task was translating Korean subtitles into English on the company’s YouTube channels, explaining other non-conventional yet creative ways to solve simple math problems. I had to think deeply about how to translate well while maintaining the original meaning. I also typeset textbooks for children and learned to use Adobe InDesign. Additionally, I organized files containing math tests for each course and spent a lot of time inspecting for typos and checking if the content was too difficult for children to understand.

One of the biggest concerns I had before starting this internship was maintaining a good relationship with my co-workers. I had heard that relationships in a company are different from those in school, and I was nervous about trying not to act like a student. However, the people I met at the company were nice and attentive. By the end of the internship, I realized I didn't need to be so nervous. Even though I had no prior work experience, they were generous with me even when I made mistakes. I heard my co-workers' life stories, and they gave me a lot of advice. Although I couldn't spend much time with my co-workers because we were busy working, their support was integral in adjusting to the work environment quickly. I was glad to learn the importance of socializing and how I should not only focus on the work but also on maintaining good relationships while at work.

Working at an office was different from what I expected. I thought companies would be heavily reliant on AI, but most of the work was simple repetitive labor. This gave me hope that there’s a chance for me compete in the work force with creative ideas that no AI could do.

During the internship, I was able to think a lot about my career and my future job. I realized that an ordinary office job wouldn’t suit me. This internship was a nice experience to know my aptitude. Moreover, I was able to spend time observing other co-workers and what drives them to work so passionately. I could see that my co-workers were not following money but following their passion and the values that they believed in. This made me want to find my true passion, something that I can spend my entire life dedicating time and effort to. Even though I’m not sure what career field I’d like to pursue, I deeply appreciate this opportunity to work at this company that made me realize how important it is to find my true passion.

Zachary “Zi” Janszen ’26

South

Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve (SSNERR), NOAA Charleston, OR

My internship was mainly working on an ecological restoration project; more specifically, Wasson Creek in the South Slough National Estuarine Research Reserve (SSNERR) under Alice Yeates, PhD. Many of my activities were involved with this project, like salvaging fish from a stream that was to be filled in, directing excavators to specific heights with Real Time Kinetic (RTK) GPS equipment to establish a 1% grade along the creek valley, monitoring the plants in the area with the research team to establish a reference site and monitor for invasive species/biodiversity.

Some of my activities were unrelated though as I was trying out multiple roles in order to try and find out what I liked best! We removed certain invasive species around the property like Scotch Broom, Purple Thistle, English Ivy, and more. I also got to interact with the outreach portion of the stewardship program to direct the removal of invasive species with a greater team. Along similar lines, I also participated in the outreach portion of the communication department by educating the public about the trails we had to offer and our current projects at the Slough. There was also some additional monitoring and research work I assisted with, like tree and shrub population monitoring at plots around the watershed, eelgrass epifauna research to support estuarine nursery habitats, and invasive green crab collection for research purposes.

Ultimately, I received a great education from some excellent peers and coworkers, although my mentor was frequently over-stressed with her restoration project. The research and monitoring work appealed to me the most of all, especially since it came with a balance of outdoor and indoor time inputting the monitoring data, but it felt incomplete without also working with the outreach side of things. The work done in science I frequently find needs more interaction with the public so that they know what the work that we do is and why it is important. Ideally, my future career can strike a balance between the research and the outreach. Also ideally, I hope I can get stronger so I can handle the manual labor, or I can avoid it altogether. It is certainly not my favorite aspect of the job.

This internship reinvigorated my passion for the natural world and made me believe that a St. John’s student can attain a career in the natural sciences. This manifests for me, at least currently, as a career in ecological engineering. It is a career path that seems to incorporate the balance of indoor and outdoor work, while trying to plan ecological projects with people in mind, which naturally would involve a lot of outreach to gather opinions. In the meantime though, I will probably be seeking employment in a similar field, though whether I go back to SSNERR depends on the funding they have available for me.

Colin Josler ‘25

Greater Cleveland Habitat for Humanity

Cleveland, OH

Over the course of the summer, I interned at Greater Cleveland Habitat for Humanity in government affairs. The department is responsible for all property acquisitions from both the city and county land banks, which are our primary sources for acquiring land for construction and renovation of housing. In addition, the department handles community outreach and engagement, government advocacy, and finding and applying for government grant opportunities. I had responsibilities in all these areas. I attended community and block events to engage with community members and ensure we were serving them in the best way possible. This included leveraging our volunteer network to collect backpacks and lunchboxes for a major parish in one of our neighborhoods so that kids would be prepared to return to school. Additionally, our department utilized our relationship with Cleveland’s Fourth District police commander to help secure troublesome abandoned homes and help facilitate a dialogue between the police and members of the community.

I was also responsible for assisting in finding and evaluating potential property acquisitions from the land banks. This involved gaining entry to these abandoned homes and assessing damage to the structures and their overall physical and economic viability for renovation or acquisition. I also attended a government advocacy event at the statehouse in Columbus, where we met with various state senators and state representatives to thank them for the ARPA and direct funds we had recently received. Finally, I had two major projects that occupied most of my summer. First, I planned the first local leader volunteer day event, inviting local leaders and politicians to volunteer on one of our construction sites to raise awareness and demonstrate the effort involved in building a house. Second, I researched various new governmental funding opportunities and compiled them into one database, which also included funding opportunities we had used in the past. This made tracking available grants much easier and allows the department to sort grants by usability. This will simplify the process of researching and keeping track of grants for the department moving forward.

Going into this internship, I was unsure of my career direction, only having a vague notion that I wanted to pursue a career in local government. However, after completing the internship, I have developed a newfound passion for community development and gained substantial knowledge in that field. One of the most important factors in reaching this conclusion was the people working at Habitat. I have never worked at an organization where it truly felt like everyone wanted to be there every day. This feeling is in stark contrast to many private organizations I have worked or interned for in the past. This type of environment is what I want in any future job, whether in government or at a nonprofit like Habitat. I was advised to keep in regular contact with the organization as it grows and that I would be considered for any open positions. I was also invited to work over the winter break and to attend Habitat for Humanity International’s Habitat on the Hill, a yearly national advocacy day for affordable housing across the country.

Segyung Jung ‘27

KECM, Seoul, South Korea

Since high school, I have been passionate about environmental conservation. I have conducted research and studied the subject on my own, always seeking an opportunity to gain work experience in the environmental field. This summer, I had my first official work experience through the Hodson internship program in my home country, Korea.

At KECM, I was assigned a desk and my own desktop computer, which made me feel like a real employee officially an adult. My role at the company involved supporting ongoing projects by researching and organizing data. Specifically, I assisted in identifying the status of penalties and incentives for energy efficiency improvement projects in the United States, known as the EERS program (Energy Efficiency Resource Standards), as well as examples of energy savings resulting from behavioral changes around the world. This internship allowed me to gain valuable knowledge about policies and regulations related to environmental issues and their impact. Additionally, I experienced the daily life of an office worker in a Korean company.

The topic of research tasks assigned were entirely new to me, requiring me to conduct background research just to understand the projects. This research provided a valuable case study of global trends in energy conservation and environmental protection. After gathering the necessary information, I compiled it into a report, learning how to format it according to the company's standards.

Research was not one of my strengths initially, but being assigned this task allowed me to develop and improve my skills in this area. I learned how to search for and find the information I needed. Initially, it took me two to three hours to find the necessary data, but by the middle of my internship, I could find the information within 30 minutes to an hour. Not only did I become faster, but I also learned to dig deeper and find more meaningful data. Through this experience, I became much more proficient and confident in conducting research. My education at St. John's, which emphasizes searching for fundamental truths, helped me understand the tasks assigned to me. I considered who would be reading my report and how it would be used, which helped me organize the report by order of importance and meet the research objectives.

In addition to the knowledge I gained about environmental issues, experiencing the life of an office worker in Korea such as commuting to work, sitting at a desk for the full workday, and managing relationships with coworkers provided valuable life lessons I could not have learned elsewhere.

These experiences opened my eyes to a broader and more diverse world. I realized there is so much I have yet to experience, and this has inspired me to dream bigger and seek out new opportunities. Through the process of researching, I discovered how much I care about environmental protection and how eager and excited I am to contribute to solving these problems. This summer allowed me to understand the current state of environmental policies and the underlying issues related to pollution and global warming. Next summer, I hope to step into the field of environmental problem-solving, working to address the world's challenges and develop sustainable solutions solutions that are not just temporary measures but a path toward a virtuous cycle. I believe the Earth has a great capacity for self-healing, and that restoring our beautiful planet is both easier and more virtuous than seeking a new one for humanity. Thank you so much for this valuable opportunity.

Sewi Jung ’26

Great Books Center, Incheon National University

Incheon, South Korea

Hosted by Prof. Yonghwa Lee (AGI01)

This summer I was an intern at the Great Books Center at Incheon University, South Korea. My internship focused mainly on assisting the GB center bring the St. John’s education model to Korea. My mentor, Mr. Yonghwa Lee, an English literature professor at Incheon University, studied for his master’s degree at St. John’s College Graduate Institute and has been willing to bring a change to the Korean education system. With this passion, he and several other professors who are interested in Liberal Arts education founded the Great Books Center at Incheon University, hoping to make changes to the Korean education system through St. John’s Great Book program. My job as an intern was: leading Seminars at the local high schools as an assistant tutor, creating manuals for both students and professors who want to work as a tutor in the future, participating in the current Seminars being held at the university to provide ideas to better carry out the pedagogy of St. John’s College in the Seminars and documenting the events that the center is part of. Documenting the events has been a huge role as president Demleitner visited Korea to sign a MOU with Incheon University, Soopna school, and Chuncheon city.

As my internship is very closely tied to what I do at St. John’s College, my work at SJC has been a huge help for what I did as an intern. It was helpful not only because I have experienced Seminars at SJC, but also because it required the ability to think creatively and intensively. As the center is in the beginning stage of implementing the St. John’s education model, the center was facing a lot of difficulties which mainly originated from the difference in culture between Korea and the United States. I’ve come to realize how much culture and history can influence education. In Korea, people must show respect to the older people, which obviously leads to how students are expected to treat their teachers. Considering how the Korean terminology for teacher means the one who was born before you, it wouldn’t be too difficult to imagine how firmly this idea has been rooted in Korean culture. I did not think this would be such a big obstacle to discussions that free our minds. It was very hard to detoxify students from the manner in which they treat teachers and participate in discussions. The sense of obligation to show respect to teachers and those meeting for the first time resulted in easily accepting what teachers say and agreeing with each other’s opinions without serious examinations and questions. As a result, the discussions mostly remained on the surface level, and it was hard to observe what I would like to call ‘digging into the text’. A lot of discussions seemed to me to be a place to present what students have thought they know.

However, facing this difficulty in the front line was not so bad since I had two other co-workers, Ms. Jungbin Moon and Mr. Daniel Kim, rising juniors at SJC Annapolis campus. We had intense discussions on how we can help the center in overcoming these difficulties. We asked St. John’s tutors, that we’ve had classes with, to fill out a survey on the St. John’s pedagogy to deliver the clearest idea of what Liberal Arts education is and what St. John’s pedagogy is. Brainstorming with my co-workers to figure out what is acting as an obstacle to having a Seminar like Johnnies

and to come up with a way to assist the center in this matter has truly been an opportunity for me to challenge myself to think more intensively about the education that I am receiving at St. John’s College.

It was also a great opportunity for me to learn about where my country, Korea, is at in terms of education. I was able to participate in the conference where humanities professors from different universities gathered to discuss how the St. John’s education model can be applied to the Korean education system and how to solve the problems that the Korean educators are facing. I am very honored and grateful that I was able to assist the professors who deeply care about the country and the young generation’s education.

Daniel Kim ‘26

Great Books Center, Incheon National University Incheon, South Korea

Hosted by Prof. Yonghwa Lee (AGI01)

I am so grateful for the amazing opportunity I had to intern at the Great Books Center of Incheon National University this past summer. It was a truly eye-opening experience that broadened what I had previously thought to be possible within the scope of my future. Throughout the internship, I learned how the skills that I learned at St. John’s College can be a powerful tool in a career setting and how a passion for education can occur outside of the classroom.

Through the internship program, I was able to work at a Korean University with two of my peers from St. John’s. INU is located

right next to the ocean much like the Annapolis campus, and they had been developing a Great Books program for the past couple of years but this summer the INU Great Books Center, INU itself, and St. John’s College signed an MOU to continue to work together. The timing of our internship aligned perfectly with President Nora Demleitner and Senior Advisor Emily Langston’s visit to Korea which added unexpected but extremely rewarding opportunities for the intern team. We attended events such as the Chun Cheon City Library’s Pilot Seminar event and the MOU signing with Incheon National University as reporters and translators as we worked to organize the speeches and translate from Korean to English as well as English to Korean. As a Korean American student, I was not fully confident in my ability to translate speeches but the MOU signing events allowed me to practice and work with my Korean international student peers to improve my translations.

Throughout this internship, I learned how vital the communication skills that students develop through the St. John’s Program can be in a work environment. When the interns gathered together to compare our translations of a speech, I felt prepared to explain my reasoning for choosing a certain subject-verb agreement or tense to use in English through an open conversation reminiscent of our freshman Greek classes. These communication skills of effectively sharing my ideas, understanding when to further explain my reasoning, and when to lead the conversation to new topics are all skills that I don’t believe I could have learned outside of St. John’s College, and each of these skills were invaluable tools that helped me save time in meetings in order to meet deadlines.

My decision to work as an intern at INU stemmed from my interest in systems of education. I have volunteered as a summer school teacher in my community since I was in middle school and worked as a paid summer school teacher once I got into college. I have a passion for helping students improve their understanding of the world through their efforts. The internship at INU provided opportunities to work with Korean high school students in St. John’s style seminars that were built on great books. Over the eight weeks that we spent in Korea I got to see students

becoming more confident in their ideas and open themselves up to sharing their questions about the text to unravel the knots of their interpretations together.

While these experiences with the high school seminar continued to inspire me to pursue the way education can impact the lives of students, I learned that this form of education does not have to take place only within educational institutions. The pilot seminar at the Chun Cheon City library showed how the community can get together with a common interest in great books to learn from each other, while the high school seminars highlighted the influence of skills fostered in the Seminar. Part of my responsibilities as an intern was to work with professors who wanted to learn how to better lead a seminar. Since we were students who had been learning for ourselves what the seminar entails, trying to help others understand for themselves provided a valuable chance to introspect.

One of the conversations I had through this internship was with a quantum mechanics professor, who mentioned that a key value of a Liberal Arts education was the skills and habits nurtured by a holistic L.A education that could be applied outside of the scope of academia. He pointed to himself as someone who had dedicated their life to mathematic proofs of quantum physics yet was a part of the leadership of the Great Books center as someone who was drawn to the essential critical thinking and communications skills fostered by the Seminar and the Liberal Arts education of St. John’s College. His next project was to further understand the role of the tutor so that he might be better equipped to help show Korean college students to value the same skills that drew him in. His passion for holistic liberal arts education channeled through programs outside of his major has inspired me to pursue graduate studies while maintaining my lifelong project of learning that was started through St. John’s College.

In reflecting on my internship, I am grateful for the opportunity to contribute to the Great Books Center and to engage with a vibrant academic community. This experience has reinforced my commitment to furthering my education and pursuing a career that integrates my passion for learning with practical applications. I look forward to continuing my journey with the confidence and skills gained through this internship, and I am excited about the future possibilities that lie ahead.

Dagny Kulkarni ‘24

New York University Press New York, NY

During the summer of 2024, I had the privilege of being able to intern at NYU Press in the Sales and Marketing Department. The generosity of the Hodson Trust Foundation allowed me to stay in New York for six weeks out of the eight-week period, and as a result I was able to gain hands-on experience, cultivate my networking skills, and form many meaningful connections with my coworkers.

NYU Press is a mid-size academic publisher, publishing titles in the humanities and social sciences. As a Sales and Marketing intern, I received a comprehensive overview of the publishing process, along with an emphasis in the specifics of marketing and publicity (both online and print). The internship taught me the basics of crafting a marketing plan for a book, how to target online and print media, what goes into setting up events and conferences, how the advertising program works, and social media techniques for promoting authors and their books. Since I am primarily interested in the editorial aspect of publishing, I was given the opportunity to attend regular editorial meetings, which allowed me to witness the process of pitching and signing titles, along with understanding what makes these titles valuable additions to an academic list. I attended weekly transmittal meetings as well, where I learned how the various aspects of marketing come to bear on a specific title and observed what considerations the Production Department had to deliberate upon.

There was a broad array of subjects that were discussed in the books that NYU Press published, ranging from anthropology and history to sociology and women and gender studies. The sheer variety of topics which we study at St. John’s made it easy to critically interpret and understand a majority of the topics that the authors explored. We were given many assignments that had to be completed before certain deadlines, and the time management and organizational skills I developed at St. John’s greatly aided me in being able to produce excellent results in a productive and timely manner.

The NYU Press team was excellent at explaining the inner workings of publishing and encouraged the interns to ask questions and take extra steps to understand every concept and technique at its root. They gave us plenty of opportunities to network and meet the other employees to obtain a well-rounded perspective of all the positions that comprise a publishing company. Lastly, the work atmosphere was incredibly welcoming and accepting, which provided a very enjoyable space to learn and grow. For my future employment endeavors, I definitely plan to seek out a similar kind of work environment.

Throughout my time here, I have become more assured of my future goal to work in the editorial department at a publishing company, and I plan on applying to various presses in New York City upon the completion of my master’s degree.

Zoe Larsen ‘27

Greenbelt Recreation Department Summer Theatre Program Greenbelt, MD

My internship with the Greenbelt Recreation Departments’ Summer Theatre Program included a wide variety of responsibilities. Of these, there were three primary focuses: Curatorial work for a history exhibit, theatre production work and performing mentoring for children ages 6-12, and theatre production work and performing mentoring for teenagers ages 13-17.

The history exhibit was built to increase viewers understanding of how racism, the New Deal, and Eleanor Roosevelt played a part in the City of Greenbelt’s early history, expanding on topics brought up in the performance of The Cookie Caper: Dorothy’s Diary, the play performed by elementary-aged children, whose characters were present day Greenbelters, scouring the local Community Center for clues to a mystery, on the way learning the history of Greenbelt. Building this exhibit incorporated skills learned at St. Johns College, among which included an ability to take in and disseminate information, finding the significant aspects that were to be shared in the exhibit. It, as well as my other responsibilities, required great skill in working with others, having discussions about how the history we were researching was significant, and figuring out how to communicate the information learned to others.

The other two focuses of my internship were relatively similar, both focused on working with relatively inexperienced, young performers; teaching skills necessary to being onstage, a large portion of which was helping them gain confidence in their abilities to perform. In addition to this, I also choreographed and taught multiple dances and stage fights for the actors to perform in the play, and gained experience in stage management, working and organizing backstage, and assisting with sound and lighting operation. Much of the work I was doing included being able to learn and act quickly, a skill I have developed at St. John’s, the rigorous course load and high expectations allowing me to gain experience in fast paced settings.

I really enjoyed working for the Recreation Department. Due to the nature of summer programs, it was a very informal workplace, allowing for relaxed interpersonal dynamics between coworkers, but still maintaining a command structure. I met and worked with a lot of very talented people, incredible artists, actors, directors, etc. Working with kids and teens is a skill I have found to be incredibly valuable, especially when finding a balance between friendship and teacher/student dynamics. This internship has taught me a lot about the nature of working, both with children and in the field of theatre. I find that I quite enjoy both. I was previously considering, and the internship has solidified my considerations, making a career in one or both of these fields. In addition to this, I have become aware of some opportunities with the Greenbelt Recreation Department that I can apply to work for, among them is co-running a summer theatre camp for teens. While nothing is set in stone, my supervisor from the internship has invited me to have a meeting to discuss possibilities of working for them in the future. I am optimistic and excited about this opportunity. It would mean continuing to work with a wonderful group of people doing something I really enjoy.

Amy Le

New

York University Press

New York City, NY

This past summer, I had the opportunity to work at NYU Press as a Marketing and Publicity Intern. It was my first time working in marketing as well as my first time in publishing. Concerning the publicity side, the bulk of my responsibilities boiled down to research and outreach. I was tasked with keeping media and academic journal contact lists up to date, reaching out to book reviewers and media outlets to inquire about potential book coverage, and curating individual PR lists for books being published in the Fall 2024 season. On the marketing side, my responsibilities centered on digital advertisement and award nominations. I was assigned to format blog posts written by NYU Press authors, write book roundups for special occasions on the blog, create eNewsletters spotlighting our books, and keep our awards tracker list up to date with deadlines. My work with the NYU Press blog also culminated in a capstone project, which was to write a blog post concerning any topic I was interested in that pertained to the academic nature of the press. I chose to write about the movie Crazy Rich Asians and how its reception reflected Asian American identity politics. Another personal project I received was to work on translation sub rights contracts. I became responsible for ensuring that they were up to date, uploading them to the new digital file system, and to reach out to publishers to inquire about whether they’d want to renew a contract.

My experiences at St. John’s helped me navigate working with people across departments. Because of the nature of the work I was doing, I often had to reach out to people in production or editorial to double check on something. The interpersonal skills I developed in classes at St. John’s helped me know what questions to ask to better understand the task I was undertaking or how, on a broader scale, the marketing and publicity teams’ work is intertwined with every department’s work through the entire publishing cycle. This constant communication was also what I enjoyed most about the work environment at the NYU Press. Because it was a mid-sized office, I was able to meet and regularly interact with everybody in the Publicity and Marketing departments as well as a good number of people in other departments. My supervisors were really welcoming and friendly, and it was easy to talk to them about anything, from work-related topics to just what my weekly plans were going to be. Even when the workload was higher, they never failed to offer their assistance or give notes on the projects I was working on. I would love to have a similar office environment in future jobs and I can definitely see myself thriving in this kind of workplace.

I came into this internship from a more legal background. My previous two internships were in immigration law and an appellate judicial role, so switching to publicity and marketing was a bit of a jump. Despite this, I came to enjoy my time at the NYU Press immensely and I ended up enjoying publicity and marketing much more than I anticipated. It helped me gain more clarity in what I want to pursue in my career following college. Prior to this internship, I would’ve gone straight to law school out of St. John’s, but now I am planning on exploring publicity careers out of school for a couple of years before I start law school. I want to apply for more internships in this field for next summer and hope to continue my experience in publishing with either a trade publisher or continue in academic publishing but at another press.

Eliane Levy ‘25

Independent Welder/Fabricator Megan McAtee Austin, TX

When I first heard about the opportunity of the Hodson Internship program, I knew that I wanted to create a more open-ended internship that would involve multiple aspects of learning a new skill. This desire was actualized as soon as I reached out to Megan McAtee about this program and the possibilities to intern with her. I was excited to learn about welding from someone whose career path I admired, from a woman who truly went about her life in such an impressive way: setting her sights on something and doing it, genuinely letting nothing stop her. Megan meanwhile told me how excited she was to be a teacher to another woman who was looking for ways to grow and become an independent person, actively working to follow their passions in a productive and empowering mode of existence. I remember feeling a burst of excitement for my future an atypical notion for me if not for the actions, then for the mode. Looking back at this moment, we certainly were not able to do everything we discussed, but I learned things I would not have expected, and I believe the passion I felt during that phone call was only cultivated throughout my experience.

During my summer with Megan McAtee, and the many fellow artists and tradespeople that she interacted with, I explored various aspects of their unique workstyle. I first spent time learning welding skills including idea creation, design, material sizing, and more and then practicing them through various-sized projects. From designing the structure or method of execution for each step, I would get a better understanding of what I learned, getting more comfortable as I went. Depending on the day, I could be learning a new skill, visiting a job site, or finding design inspiration from local art. I was able to safely learn how to work with an oxy acetylene torch tank or a mig welding machine, and then practice those skills for other individual and group projects. This meant that focus, organization, and designing an efficient while also safe step-by-step process were all necessary components to my daily life at the shop.

The small but reliable circle of experienced individuals also meant that my learning was cultivated by each person I worked with, and I felt like a student to people that had the capacity and desire to teach me. Although I was at first hesitant to feel comfortable in an active shop with potential danger always within reach, Megan and others consistently respected my own thoughts and questions to help me learn the protocol. The environment was facilitated by artistic and capable individuals looking for unique and beautiful ways to complete projects, so being enfolded into this dynamic was therefore stimulating to those same goals I had for my own work. The constant and varied source of collaboration and knowledge felt like a seminar discussion: each person being treated as a potential source of learning for everyone else, working to construct a solid understanding for the betterment of everyone in the room.

This environment encouraged me to feel comfortable and capable of accomplishing whatever project I was interested in, and ultimately is a working environment that I would like to replicate in the future. I felt empowered to execute my plans, while still maintaining a safe and

educational process. The purpose of this internship was to explore career options beyond the scope of intangible philosophical knowledge, but I was lucky enough to have a combined experience of physical work and mental growth or creativity. I am extremely grateful for my mentor because I honestly believe her attitude enabled this mode of work, especially because my past work experiences have shown how difficult this balance is to achieve successfully.

Overall, I can confidently remark that this experience has shaped my current goals after graduation, and I would like to follow in the footsteps of this practice: learning a skill or trade that encourages personal creativity and responsibility and fulfilling these skills in a close-knit community full of genuine individuals passionate about sharing and collaborating their unique experiences. I am excited to take new steps after graduation towards this goal both through the group of people I have already met, as well as cultivating new relationships and skills beyond this internship. Megan has already offered me a position anytime I am back in Austin, so I know that I will be able to continue learning from her and all the amazing people that she works with. She believes in my education and passion for reaching new levels of independence, and I am so grateful for the opportunity to connect with her and better understand what and how I would like to pursue a career. Although I do not believe that a career should be the sole priority in one’s life, I do believe that the way Megan and others like her have established their workstyle can be extended to other aspects of life, from independence and self-assurance to responsibility and fostering community.

Isaac DongJae Lim ’25

Digital Publishing, St. John’s College

Annapolis, MD

Historically, St. John’s College manuals have primarily consisted of scanned PDF copies. These copies often suffered from poor scan quality, resulting in pages that were difficult to read. Issues such as slanted pages and the school's attempts to scan already-scanned copies led to ugly and illegible documents.

Many Johnnies, I believe, have complained and voiced frustrations with the poor conditions of the manuals at least once in their time at St. John’s. As complaints grew, it became increasingly clear that updating the manuals to a more readable version was essential for the future of the college.

To address this need, the Digital Internship Team concentrated on two main objectives: identifying and correcting any typos or errors in the existing manuals and creating new manuals using LaTeX for better design and readability.

One of the most fascinating aspects of this project was learning how to use LaTeX. With no prior experience, Mr. Sharpe and I had to start from scratch, spending a good amount of time to researching everything from basic to advanced Latex commands necessary for implementing the manuals as we envisioned.

The biggest takeaway from this internship has been realizing that this is not the career path I want to pursue after St. John’s, and I mean this positively! While I thoroughly enjoyed learning and working with LaTeX, I discovered that my excitement stemmed mostly from the fact that I was contributing to the polity and knowing that this project had a finite end, being a summer project. I couldn’t envision myself sitting down in front of the computer coding from 9 to 6 (or for much longer). This project was a refreshing change, a short break from great books, allowing me to engage with modern technologies, as opposed to spending the entire summer reading a 1,200-page Russian novel.

Where many of soon-to-be college graduates, myself included, make mistakes is, I believe, spending too much time searching for the perfect job they want to do, when there is an easier and more effective approach of exploring various things and identifying what they don’t want their future to be spent on. This internship has been invaluable in that regard, making it one of the most significant experiences of my time at St. John’s College.

Nathaniel Martin ’24

NOAA with NCCOS

(National Center for Coastal and Ocean Science)

Beaufort, NC (remote)

This summer I held an internship with NOAA’s NCCOS (the National Center for Coastal and Ocean Science). In the line office of NCCOS that I was a part of, spatial planners develop suitability models for offshore wind development. As a communications intern in this line office, I attended weekly meetings with the team to go over where each region was at in the spatial planning process, and I created infographics to inform the public and interested parties from tangential organizations on the work that we accomplish at the office. In order for any Wind Energy Area to be leased for development, BOEM (Bureau of Ocean Energy Management) works closely with NCCOS to make sure that they are leasing the space most suitable for this development. This takes into account social, economic, sustainability, and national security data layers, to name a few.

I created multiple infographics to increase engagement with my organization, videos to post to social media, and documents to share with interested parties at data development events in their regions. I feel that my work at St. John’s College helped me to quickly learn the terminology associated with this science organization in its communications as well as to develop relationships with my coworkers in a remote setting. In addition to the tasks of my internship, I also met with people in the policy department of NCCOS to learn the ways that NCCOS engages and briefs congress on scientific matters. This information will help me when navigating where to take my career following the law education that I plan to start in August.

I learned over the course of this internship that a fully remote workspace definitely has its downsides. I learned that I will prefer to work at an in-person location in the future. It is harder for me to develop relationships with my co-workers in a remote setting, and I prefer the ease of access to others in in-person work settings. However, I really did enjoy working for a governmental organization and this may impact the way that I seek future employment. Everyone was more laid-back and approachable in the online setting, which I really admired. I prefer unserious people to ones who take themselves too seriously; however, this is not to be correlated with the amount of work getting done by this team. My eyes were opened to the great amount of work that it takes to ensure our blue economy is being planned in a way that respects scientific data and all the parties involved in developing that data.

Jungbin Moon ‘26

Great Books Center, Incheon National University Incheon, South Korea

Hosted by Prof. Yonghwa Lee (AGI01)

Until this last summer, the past summers that were always a “break” for me, were like dreams that break and create a “different” reality, disconnecting myself from real life. However, my internship this summer was a continuation of my St. John’s experience, similar but somewhat extended from what I have been going through within the town full of red bricks and yachts.

I had three questions in mind What is the ideal form of education? What is the essence of liberal arts education at St. John’s College? How can we apply this seminarbased education to other educational institutions with different backgrounds? Working at the Great Books Center at Incheon National University with my fellow Johnnies, I was able to learn more than what I had expected and rediscover the value of Liberal Arts education that I might have been too familiar with to appreciate.

The biggest part of the internship was to assist seminars as an assistant tutor and to create instructional materials to introduce students to the value of discussion-based education. Since our internship period started just as President Nora Demleitner and Ms. Emily Langston (Senior Advisor to the President) visited Korea for a MOU signing with several colleges and high schools, I also had an opportunity to participate in the conferences and workshops in which we discussed the problems of the current Korean education system and the importance of Liberal Arts education to “make free adults out of children.” I was able to work as a reporter, taking photos and making documents about the meetings during President Demleitner and Ms. Langston’s visit and translate it in both Korean and English to make it available for both St. John’s College and Incheon National University. It was very wonderful for me to participate in this first step of making connections between St. John’s College and other Korean educational institutes.

Since the professors at Incheon National University were already passionate about the holistic model of liberal arts education at St. John’s and had been pondering about how to adapt this education model within Korea’s educational atmosphere, I always had someone to talk with whenever I had questions about the work and think about the possible changes of the current application of liberal arts education in Korea.

Even though I was physically halfway across the world from St. John’s College, I was able to continue to learn about the nature of Liberal Arts education and share its value with others through the Hodson Internship program. This internship at INU allowed me to connect my future career with what I learn and continue practicing which are at least two of the core principles of a St. John’s education always questioning and striving to make a better society.

El’ad Nichols-Kaufman ’25

Pima County Development Services, Planning Division

Tucson, AZ

Urban planning, for the most part, encompasses two different but very interrelated elements. On the one hand, there is long range, comprehensive planning. This planning is centered on providing guidelines for years to come to ensure that all changes that take place in a community are in accordance with a vision for the future of that area.

Achieving that goal comes through comprehensive plans, area plans, park system plans, and more, creating suggestions for a wide variety of departments to ensure these plans come to fruition. The other element, current planning, is much more

immediate, and makes sure that every new construction obeys the rules of the local code. In a way, this is the practical action that brings about the future envisioned in a long-term plan.

I had been fortunate to explore the world of comprehensive planning through a previous Hodson internship, which added to my already existing fascination with planning, but also left me with some questions about the efficacy of the plans I worked to help make. I learned a lot about how to gain public input and buy-in, and how good planners make plans that benefit the whole community, but I never got to see those plans in action. To try to get a glimpse of that world, which brings about that change that communities ask for, I turned to this year’s internship.

At Pima County, I dived straight into the bureaucracy of local planning. People often dread this kind of government, with complaints of slow, inefficient, and irrational bureaucracy being quite common. From the inside, I definitely got a sense of how this comes about, as some of the workers in the office were very much operating mechanically, and doing the least amount of work possible, providing little help to the public. Some tasks, such as writing zoning verification letters, seemed so pointless that even I found myself disengaging, and slipping into a mechanical routine. However, many of the other workers, most of all my mentor, were very dedicated to making sure that they were best helping the people of Pima County, and that every step that they took had the aim of helping the community. I found my mentor’s approach particularly heartening, since he took an active role in advocating for code changes to the Planning and Zoning Commission when it became clear that existing code did not have a good reason behind it, or when a small change might substantially improve the lives of people in Pima County. People like him, and the work he did, helped me see the good that can come from the planning profession when truly dedicated people work in it.

During the internship, I talked to people in person and on the phone who were asking about regulations, and helped staff with research on specific cases, or on state laws. I created several presentations about county initiatives, and wrote one booklet to be used by developers, as well as a letter addressed to people intending to live off-grid. I was also assigned two cases in which I

was the responsible staff member. The first, a conditional use permit hearing, was for a horse sanctuary. I recommended approval, based on the high standards the sanctuary held, and the hearing examiner ruled in the applicants favor. This case was a good one to start with, since it largely had public support, and the work mainly focused on analyzing the code and making the argument of why the applicant’s case merited approval. The second case, however, was a bit more complicated.

The second case was a variance application by a woman who wanted to use a manufactured home as a guest house. I was told it was the policy of the county to prohibit this, all hinging on the use of the word “erected” in the definition of guest house. However, by an examination of other parts of the code, I found that reasoning did not quite hold up, and the zoning examiner, another one of my supervisors, had to make a new determination about the reason this was prohibited. After this, I wrote my report, and had to recommend denial, due to the applicant’s failure to meet most of the variance standards. Many of her neighbors showed up in opposition, and the Board of Adjustment ruled against her, accepting my recommendations. In both cases, I exercised many skills that came from my time at St. John’s, including synthesizing a large variety of written materials and forming my thoughts into reasoned statements and conversing with many people with different ideas about what to do with a case, and finding a course forward through discussion.

At the end of this internship, I found myself thinking differently about my future. In one way, it reinforced my desire to continue pursuing work in a planning related profession. I was fascinated by the work of analyzing code and building arguments based off of it, and examining how that could be applied to real cases that impact the built environment around me. However, I was discouraged by some of the bureaucratic attitudes I encountered. When I brought this up in a conversation with my mentor, he recommended I look into attending law school, and particularly focusing on land use law. Much of the work of planning relies on the legal underpinnings of zoning and development codes, which require legal knowledge and reasoning to navigate. Through this internship, I learned about that avenue of study, and was encouraged to look into it.

Much of what I saw in this internship I hope to replicate in the future. I had a chance to get hands-on with specific cases, and help members of the public with their cases, things which made my work feel worthwhile. Likewise, I got a chance to meet with members of many different government bodies, and collaborate on projects, something that I found very informative and engaging. While I would not necessarily want to return to some of the office dynamics and would hope to avoid the stasis that government work sometimes leads to, I found the experience overall a very positive one, and the workplace one I may someday return to.

Chloe Niedzielski ’25

Smithsonian Environmental Research Center (SERC) Edgewater, MD

This summer I took an unexpected internship at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center in Edgewater, Maryland. Though I was originally interested in a position surrounding fieldwork, I joined a project that aimed to understand how legislation reports on marine biodiversity. The task was called “policy analysis”, which was mostly gibberish to me, so I wanted to better understand what kind of work the phrase described.

Through my work at SERC, I came to understand policy analysis as a kind of translation: I read lots of federal and local policies and converted them into data on topics that scientists were interested in. My project with MarineGEO focused on three case studies: federal, Chesapeake Bay, and Mobile Bay. We wanted to understand if federal and/or local legislation explicitly mention biodiversity, and if not, were they indirectly referring to biodiversity, and with what words. To answer these questions, I created a coding dictionary of keywords that the team might be interested in, and a report on which documents used which words and how frequently. It was an iterative process of reading different pieces of legislation to recognize jargon, so we found that the framework itself was part of our results.

I was surprised at how much my work at SERC was like St. John’s. I was given lots of independence on my project, to explore new methods, and incorporate my own questions. Even in meetings with big-time scientists, I was always encouraged to add my own perspective, and assured that it was valuable to the team. My favorite part of working at SERC was hearing the reports from people working on other projects. No matter how much we knew about their topic, everyone was engaged in asking questions and offering suggestions. Everything felt like a big brainstorm activity, and anyone you met was sure to be interested in your work. I’m not sure if I will return to SERC for work, but I know I want to work with people who approach working like they do: openminded and excited.

After my internship I still hope to pursue vet medicine, but my interest in words, and how people use them, will always be a part of my career.

Christopher O’Connor ’25

GemsOnVhs

Nashville TN

I have thoroughly enjoyed working with Anthony Simpkins, director of GemsOnVhs, over the course of this summer and have been exposed to the variety of responsibilities it takes to produce a successful creative enterprise.

I was tasked with research into Folk Music History, combing through the Library of Congress archives, curating the monthly playlist, shipping merchandise to patrons, taking photos for products, producing VHS tapes, as well as getting to be an extra hand on shoots with artists both in and out of the office.

I feel that my work at St. John’s prepared me better in some of the projects I worked on than others. The research and archival projects felt very familiar to my work at the college, seeing as they were written pieces I also felt that the dynamic nature of the program allowed me to quickly pick up the operations behind the equipment used on shoots and for producing tapes, often times being comfortable reading the manual helped greatly. However, when it came to the more digital side of things, I felt that I was lacking.

Having experienced this opportunity, it has definitely effected my career goals for the future. My favorite aspect of this work has been being able to be on the production side of shoots and would love to find an opportunity to get more experience in that field. While working with Anthony in a small team has been a great environment to learn in, I would like to find an opportunity that produces at a larger scale and shoots more consistently.

The most challenging part of this experience was, aside from being on shoots, most of the work was done independently. Going forward I would prefer to work with a team instead. I plan to continue to work with Anthony remotely in some manner.

Alexander Paden ’25

Appellate Court of Maryland, Judge Nazarian’s Chambers

Annapolis, MD

My internship in Judge Nazarian’s Chambers was a unique opportunity. This was because, first, judges rarely invite undergraduates to intern for them. So, Judge Nazarian has shown himself to be unusually open-minded in consistently having undergraduate interns. It was also unique because, not only did I get to work in a judge’s chambers, but I was able to conduct legal research and write bench memoranda: work usually reserved for law clerks. These bench memoranda were the substance of my internship. In writing them, I took cases filed by parties appearing before the court, analyzed their arguments, checked their citations, and finally produced a document arguing how I thought the judge should rule on their case. I was able to produce two of these seven-page memoranda in a month.

My work at St. John’s helped me enormously throughout this internship. In fact, this experience made me appreciate how very similar the work of a Johnnie is to the work of a lawyer. While researching, I was asked to follow, analyze, and check the citations of dense arguments. This task is probably intimidating for non-Johnnies, but I knew none of it could be more difficult than reading Aristotle or Kant. So, I was able to slip back into seminar-reading mode for this aspect of my internship, comfortably approaching a different subject matter with the same logical eye. As for the writing: when double-spaced, my memoranda came out to roughly fourteen pages, i.e., the length of a freshman annual essay. So, my experience with essays both longer and shorter than that gave me confidence in this new arena of writing.

However, even considering how familiar the work felt to a Johnnie, I am not trying to say that this internship, or legal work generally, was easy. Legal arguments are not as difficult to read as Aristotle, but they can get close. Further, as Johnnies, we do not typically have to consult multiple sources, both primary and secondary, to find information for our essays. This is necessary when doing legal writing, and that necessity prompts an even further one: familiarity with the style and use of legal citations. Also, when writing, one is expected to take a firm position and to defend it rigorously with an abundance of evidence. Thus, the writing tends to be more argumentative than the exploratory style of the apocryphal “Johnnie essay.” So, the work is definitely still new, challenging, and, for those reasons, especially rewarding.

Overall, my career goals have concretized as a result of this internship. Last summer, I worked at the State’s Attorney’s (i.e., Prosecutor’s) Office here in Annapolis for my Hodson Internship, mostly doing bureaucratic work. That internship familiarized me with a legal office environment. This internship allowed me to move beyond familiarity with a legal environment and into familiarity with actual legal work. The experiences built on each other, confirming my ability to, and interest in, pursuing a legal career. So, I am now definitely going to law school, both aiming to be a lawyer and dreaming of being a judge.

Regarding the work environment, I enjoyed its flexible and relaxed nature. That is not to say that one can wear pajamas to work (I recommend slacks and a jacket), but more that it is a quiet office, where one can typically come and go at pleasure. As a Hodson intern, I worked in-office forty hours per week. However, if you’d like to work fewer hours, the Judge’s minimum is only about two days in-office per week. You are also free to ask your mentor, typically the “Chambers’ Counsel / Senior Law Clerk,” whenever you’re stuck or have questions. The Judge is also very open to questions, loving to talk whenever he’s available, about almost anything that you’d like to know. However, this is a two-edged sword, as while people are open to helping you, they will not baby-sit you while you work. Unless I asked a question or initiated a conversation, I was mostly left to my own devices to do my work. So, one must be self-motivated in order to work in Judge Nazarian’s Chambers.

Summing up, I would like to duplicate the flexible, casual, and overall independent work environment in my future employment, as well as, obviously, the legal work. While I doubt that I will be employed at the Maryland Appellate Court again, as my aspirations point me in a different direction, I still highly recommend the experience for anyone wanting a real sense of what a legal career can look like.

Alexandra Paul ‘26

New York University Press

New York, New York

Interning at the New York University Press was an incredible experience and opportunity.

Most of my activities involved tasks that were easy but took a long time. Such tasks were things like shipping books to reviewers, formatting blog posts, imputing book information, among other things.

The work at St. John’s College helped prepare me for this internship in that the class structure emphasizes communication and to ask questions when you have them. This helped me ask my coworkers for help when I needed it and to effectively divide tasks with my coworkers.

I would still like to work in publishing, but I don’t know if I want to work in academic publishing. I also don’t know what position I want to have in publishing, but this internship allowed me to get a sense of the different jobs available in a publishing house.

All of my coworkers were very welcoming and always had time to help me and answer questions. My supervisor was always very understanding and very easy to talk to. I would like to see this kind of welcoming and warm environment in my future workplaces along with the dedication everyone has to their role in getting books published.

While I could see myself working there if offered the opportunity, I would still like to explore other publishing houses. This one was small so working at a bigger one would give me a chance to compare the two workplaces and better understand the kind of work and place I can see myself in. Even if I do end up changing my mind about going into publishing, this experience was incredibly valuable, and I am thankful to have been given the chance to do it.

Tia Peterson ‘25

Biospot Lab, University of San Diego

San Diego, CA

This summer I worked in the Biophysics Department at the University of San Diego under the mentorship of Dr. Rae Robertson-Anderson. I worked on a project that uses a very basic circadian rhythm found in cyanobacteria to make living materials. Living materials are materials, like plastics, usually nonliving, that become “living” by combining the materials with living organisms.

In this case, the living part of the materials were kai proteins: KaiABC. KaiABC are the three proteins behind a basic circadian rhythm originally found in cyanobacteria. This circadian rhythm consists of a 24-hour binding and unbinding cycle, which occurs through phosphorylation. We used a very strong and well-known streptavidin/biotin bond to bind different kinds of materials to these proteins so that the non-living materials in this process (such as the plastic beads added to the Kai proteins) would also bind and unbind in the same 24-hour circadian cycle with no outside intervention.

I joined the stage of the project where there had already been successful observation and documentation of the beads clumping over a set amount of time, but there had not been any continuous documentation of this process finalizing the unbinding of the beads. The lack of documentation was due to the fact that the beads were denser than the water buffer in which they were suspended. Because of this density difference, the beads sank during the imaging process on the microscope, and they inadvertently stuck to the coverslip. To solve this problem, Dr. Anderson added deuterium oxide (D2O) to the process. Deuterium is an isotope of hydrogen. With one extra neutron, the compound is denser than water, although similar in many other ways; colloquially, D2O is known as “heavy water.” Using the D2O, we were able to image continuously, as the beads no longer sank nor stuck to the cover slip, and we could see the clumping in action.

Another aspect of the project that I worked on was trying to connect DNA to the Kai proteins to make the material even more organic. Working with the DNA was more challenging because it was much smaller than the non-living polystyrene beads. I had to label DNA with fluorescence and biotin, and then purify that DNA to heighten the concentration.

My St. John’s education gave me a baseline understanding of the scientific method, as well as the skills for careful and critical reading of the scientific papers that were essential to my understanding of the project. This summer was also my first experience in a laboratory and office environment. I had to manage relationships both with superiors and with peers. It was interesting to observe different perspectives people had of their jobs and the work in general, and to observe how those outlooks affected their time in the office. I found that keeping a positive mindset and putting in a lot of effort took you a long way, both in terms of learning the research goals and processes well, as well as learning how to succeed in a social office environment. I made friends with other positive and hardworking people, and I was able to make work a fun and meaningful place to be. Like my time at St. John’s, I discovered that such work can also be connecting and fulfilling.

Tamar Pinsky ‘26

NOAA Sustainable Fisheries

Silver Spring, MD

My internship began with an abundance of acronyms. On my first day, I walked into NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration) Headquarters, and I was immediately received into NMFS (National Marine Fishery Service), embraced as a member of SF3 (Office of Sustainable Fisheries.) My mentor, Justin Pearce, told me of his gratitude for my arrival, because he planned to give me work that he himself would take on if he only had the time in his jam-packed agenda.

As one of the main people working on BREP (Bycatch Reduction Engineering Program), Pearce told me that the program needed a review, as it has not been evaluated ever since it started in 2012. NOAA should be made aware to what extent its BREP program is successful.

Each year, BREP funds 10-15 projects that conduct research on methods to reduce bycatch which is the unintended catch and/or harm of fish and other marine animals. My main assignment involved studying the 170+ BREP projects to determine which ones were successful with success being defined by whether the projects led to regulations. I then created a narrative outlining the progressions of successful projects from their origins to their involvement with NOAA’s BREP program to their regulations. My second assignment involved working on the BREP Report to Congress that details the projects from 2021. I aided with editing, compiling photos, and drafting a roll-out plan for the report.

During both of my assignments, I noticed that I especially enjoyed the writing and editing elements. It is not exactly a new revelation for me, but I was surprised that I could get excited to edit and write about topics even if they were not inherently engaging to me all around. I found within me a work ethic, an ability to put in effort both when there is a lot of interest and when the interest fades which I find similar to the way I study St. John’s texts, with some striking me so much more than others, but my need to put in work to study remaining in each.

I hope to achieve the virtue of diligence, and I believe my internship has gotten me closer. The direction to aim this diligence, or the passion about which my future career ought to revolve, I still need to determine. I do have an interest in environmental law or perhaps a different area of law and while I remain undecided on whether to pursue this field I am grateful to have seen the inner workings of a government environmental job.

I found it surprisingly delightful to work in a government building. I met several employees in my department, and all were kind enough to tell me about their job, and to answer the plethora of questions I had. I befriended a few of the other interns at NOAA, and we went out together to a court hearing about North Atlantic Right Whales, to get a private tour at the Natural History Museum, and to lunch whenever our in-office days coincided. Unfortunately, because of the work-from-home option, sometimes I would be in a near-empty office building. I wish I could have talked in person to my mentor a few times more; it always outshined our virtual meetings. Regardless, I appreciate my mentor immensely, for checking in with me practically every day, keeping me on track without micromanaging me. I am thankful to him for taking both my work and my fulfillment seriously he valued my contributions greatly, and my happiness even more which I think led to me being even more motivated to do my best. I hope that I can find such kind and caring people in my future employment which who knows? may be at NOAA or a different part of the government.

Lainey Rendelman ’26

United States Tennis Association, National Campus Orlando, FL

During my internship with the United States Tennis Association, I interned within the Play and Competition department, specifically on the Tennis on Campus and HS Tennis team. My day-to-day work included tracking grant applications for club tennis teams on college campuses and two additional pilot programs. I helped plan for the department’s 25th anniversary and wrote player guides for a section qualifier tournament and their national championship. I also assisted in the credential application approval process for college coaches looking to attend the Junior U.S. Open to recruit future collegiate athletes. The internship program also included a group project. During the group project I worked with a team of 11 other interns spanning across four offices and two time zones to create and propose a new more interactive onboarding process.

Specifically, during work on the group project, I noticed the impact of my work at St. Johns. The work we do in discussion made me a better listener and more effective communicator. Language class and collaborating on translations taught me how to be more open minded in discussions where I may have had a differing idea or opinion. I also found I was in a unique position when it came to discussing the types of schools we should be including in the publicity push of the grant. I had a wider knowledge of small schools simply because I considered them differently than my coworkers who had never heard of them or experienced a small school environment.

My career goals shifted during my internship, I realized the dreaded nine to five office job was truly not bad at all and that I quite enjoyed it. I discovered that I love the behind-the-scenes programing of the sports world not just the social media and broadcasting I had been so dead set on before. This internship helped me realize my why. Why I wanted to work in sports and just how my education and experience here connected.

My why and my reason is that ever since a young age I have found a sense of community and home in sports, whether it was playing on a team or being a part of a conglomeration of fans. My goals and dreams are now motivated by that knowledge, and they truly converge at the desire to be a catalyst of community and a facilitator of a place that makes someone else feel at home. Sports is the great unifier, and I want to spend my life cultivating community and welcoming even more people into the world whether it is in a play capacity or a fan capacity.

I liked going into the office and having meetings with coworkers, but I felt a tad out of place on a remote workday, especially if there were no meetings on the calendar. I eventually stopped taking all my remote days and that helped me cultivate better professional relationships in the office and to see even more departments than the one I was assigned.

In the future I hope to find a company that puts as much of an emphasis on the wellbeing of their staff and that is as driven by the commitment to community that USTA is. I do see USTA as a potential place of employment in the future and would be overjoyed if the opportunity arose to intern there again next summer.

Thomas Robinson ’25

NOAA, Beaufort Lab

Coastal Reserve & National Estuarine Research Reserve

Beaufort, NC

Working with NOAA remotely has presented its challenges and benefits. My initial tasks were with ImageJ, an imaging freeware we used to set grids and analyze the amount of sediment, healthy oysters, and dead oysters in oyster reefs along the coast of Beaufort, North Carolina. These grids were comprised of about 75 nodes per image and were very simple to set up and scan. The scan was done manually by me and the other interns with NOAA. Depending on where the nodes landed, we’d make the call if the node was an alive oyster, dead oyster (AKA Cover), or sediment. This task was remarkably easy, I was ahead of all the interns and lead newer additions to the team in learning how to use the software. During this time my coworkers would come to me for help, and I felt like I was really making a difference for the team. This feeling was what I was looking for in an internship, and it’s a feeling I hope to replicate in the future.

Unfortunately, this set the bar far too high, as the tasks got much harder. After some weeks passed, we moved to using ArcGIS, a mapping software, to calculate the rugosity of the same oyster reefs. Learning the workflow to calculate the rugosities of these reefs through ArcGIS was a serious learning curve. It got to the point where I visited in person in order to learn the workflow. The lab was great. While I was there, I got to process some oysters from the reefs I was analyzing digitally. I also got to meet some of the interns, whose comments and emails I’d been reading for weeks prior. It was good to meet them, and they were all good people, but I concluded that I would not be working for the Beaufort Lab in the future, but I still see NOAA, as an organization, as a potential candidate. After my visit, the rugosity workflow had become much easier and the task has been completed.

My final task, and the most difficult, was delineating footprints of the same oyster reefs I’ve been working with all summer. This internship has been really rewarding in terms of figuring out what I want to do after I graduate. I still want to work in the environmental world, but oyster reefs may be the exception in what I want to work with. Criticisms aside, this internship has been very rewarding in terms of work experience. Learning how to use ArcGIS is something I couldn’t learn at St. John’s, so I’m glad I have a new tool in my toolkit.

Louis Rosenberg ’25

Tomoyasu Lab, Miami University Oxford, OH

I started my internship at Dr. Tomoyasu’s lab this summer not entirely sure what to expect. Although I’ve been planning to become an entomologist for several years, this was my first time in a lab environment and my first time conducting original research. There were a handful of students working in the lab with me this summer, all of whom has also been working there over the school year as well. I worked most closely with Emily Davidson, a rising senior at Miami University, and Abby Keith, a PhD student at Miami, also provided assistance.

Throughout the previous year, Emily had been working on surveying wing features across a variety of lines of red flour beetles (T. castaneum), observing the differences in hindwing and elytra shapes, vein patterns within the hindwings, and other interesting features, such as number of sensory bristles along the wing margin. For my work this summer, I did the same thing for a line of beetles that she had not yet examined, known as ue (short for unsclerotized elytra, these beetles have a mutation which causes portions of their elytra to be unhardened while portions of their hindwings are sclerotized).

I spent most of the summer dissecting beetles and mounting their wings, and then I concluded the internship by looking at the wings and collecting data on the phenotype exhibited by each specimen for further analysis. I had a nice rhythm throughout most of the summer, with a selection of tasks to work on each day. For example, I would sift out pupae from my colony each day, then divide them by sex. After the pupae eclosed (became adult beetles), I would place them in a labelled vial and dissect them 10 days later. At the start of the summer, while my colony was still maturing, I practiced dissections on other lines to prepare for my work the beetles are very small, so removing the wings under a microscope without crushing or tearing them took practice. I enjoyed having the opportunity to switch between tasks as I got tired, as it gave a nice variety to what otherwise could have been fairly monotonous microscope work. I also appreciated how supportive Dr. Tomoyasu and the other lab members were I was encouraged to observe the other students’ work and ask questions about it, even when it wasn’t directly related to my own work. Because of this, I also learned about some microbiology techniques which may be of use in the future. The data I ended up gathering was included on a poster Emily presented at a conference at the end of the summer, for which I was listed as a contributor. I am also planning to continue discussing my project with Dr. Tomoyasu and the rest of his team with the hopes of publishing a paper on it.

While my career goals have not changed, I have reconsidered applying to graduate school this year because of the summer. Dr. Tomoyasu and the graduate students in the lab stressed the importance of having a specific research goal before committing to a lab, seeing as entomologists tend to work on topics directly related to their thesis for most of their career. I am now hoping to find a research assistant job to work at after I graduate while I nail down my specific interests within entomology, then apply to graduate school after a year or two. I’m specifically hoping to find a field research position so that I can compare a more active job with a lab-based one. That said, I would definitely be willing to return to Dr. Tomoyasu’s lab in the future, and having considerate, friendly, and helpful coworkers like I did this summer is absolutely something that I will be looking for at jobs down the line.

Maxwell Schleien ’26

Maryland State Archives

Annapolis, MD

This summer, I worked as an intern at the Maryland State Archives located in Annapolis. I spent most of my time in the imaging department where I scanned many different documents. These included marriage certificates, photographs from local communities, scrapbooks, newspapers, and a few court cases. I used different scanning tools including a paper document scanner and an overhead camera system. After scanning the documents, I would then process the scans. Sometimes this would just encompass renaming the files. With the overhead camera, I would crop and edit the photos of the documents. I also added metadate descriptions to previously scanned items. In addition to the typical day-to-day work, I also had the opportunity to visit many historical and archive related sites around Annapolis. I was given a tour of the State House, including a visit to the top of the dome, visited the Banneker-Douglass Museum, and even got to look inside the archives of the Greenfield Library.

My experience working at the Maryland State Archives was pleasant. Everyone was very kind and helpful to me and the other interns. The work of scanning was very enjoyable. It was wonderful coming in and seeing what new documents had to be scanned and the challenges they brought with them. Different documents needed to be scanned on different machines and could require varying levels of care and attention, especially with documents dating back to the time of the Revolutionary War. Scanning was also well suited to me since I could do it myself without much interaction or interference from others. Most days, I would listen to music or Don Quixote while I was working. However, scanning also had a tendency to get very tedious. The excitement of a new project slowly vanished as I continued working on it. The first hundred documents are fun to scan, the next thousand aren’t as much. Furthermore, with the larger collections that required scanning, it was disheartening knowing that there was no real end in sight. Coming in multiple days and scanning just a few drops from a vast ocean of the same type of document is a terrible feeling.

Overall, this experience has reinforced my interest in working in the field of history. While I don’t think I want to be scanning again, I would happily work at an archive again. I would even be fine returning to the Maryland State Archives. I loved interacting with historic documents and learning more about different communities. Going through the stacks, I could feel the vast wealth of knowledge stored there for everyone. I would love nothing more than to continue preserving history for us and future generations to access.

Keely Schrantz ’26

Anne Arundel County State’s Attorney’s Office

Annapolis, MD

At the State’s Attorney Office, I worked on closed cases, organizing and uploading physical documents into our database, PbK, as well as organizing and managing the digital files. As my supervisor put it, I was put in charge of taking count of all the large physical evidence we had in the office, i.e. blown-up photos on poster boards, and put them into our database. This involved organizing the boards and determining which case they went to, some being as old as 1992, and photographing them with a camera so I could upload the pdfs onto PbK. This gave me an insight into many fascinating high-level cases the office has dealt with, and the methods they used to persuade jurors beyond a reasonable doubt.

We also would often go to watch our prosecutors in court multiple times a week to see them in action. We had the opportunity to go on “field trips” to places such as the Detention Center and the Commissioner’s Office. St. John’s College has helped me in communicating with my boss and the other interns to work together and get projects done.

Going into the internship, I knew I was interested in going into law, but seeing lawyers in their field and getting the opportunity to talk to them has solidified my goals greatly. I really liked to see how the lawyers work together, professionally and colloquially, seeing as how dark criminal cases can be, they know how to lighten up the job to make it doable.

On the other hand, I found that there were some communication issues amongst the staff members with how things should or should not be organized, what should or should not be thrown away, etc. My fellow interns were generally very excited about the work we were doing, and all the lawyers were very excited to talk about their cases and experience. My supervisor was very devoted to her job and to providing us with insight into an attorney’s day-to-day work, but sometimes struggled with communicating instructions.

I would like to duplicate the comradery and professional friendships that our prosecutors share, helping each other out and keeping up morale. I could definitely see myself working here if I stay in the Annapolis/Baltimore area. The photo is with the other lovely summer interns when we happened to be outside during a fire drill, I’m on the far right!

Bennett Scott ’24

Electrophysiology

of Experience, Memory, and Knowledge (EMK) Lab

University of Chicago, Chicago, IL

I am spending this summer working at the Electrophysiology of Experience, Memory, and Knowledge Lab at the University of Chicago. I have a few different responsibilities which can roughly be categorized as: drive building, animal work, and data analysis.

In our lab, we use a piece of equipment called an optodrive which sits atop the rat’s head and both records their neural activity and stimulates their brain. However, getting the exact position for where the wires ought to go in the rat’s brain requires a great deal of precision, amplified by the current design of the drive which can lead to the wires moving in the exact opposite direction from what’s desired. I have been working with a couple of other people to test out new designs for the optodrive in the hopes of reducing this issue.

So far as animal work, my primary responsibility has been socialization. The rats we work with at the lab, particularly those used in experiments, are much easier to handle if they’ve gotten used to being handled by human beings. Socializing the rats involves spending about half an hour every day with them, feeding, handling, and playing with them so that they will be better suited to working with humans in the future.

I also spend a lot of time working on data analysis. The step from the raw input of our experiments, really just a recording of where the rat moves and what the optodrive is detecting in the brain, to actually comprehensible data can be quite a large one. I have been working in Python to create an algorithm which does the first step in this process, taking the input and then plotting it. These plots will hopefully make it easier for us to see if there are any patterns within the data that might be worth investing the time to analyze.

In some ways, St. John’s helped a lot in preparing me for this job: I’ve had to learn a lot of new skills, read difficult papers outside of my comfort zone, and spend a lot of time focusing on details. However, I think having a pre-existing set of other skills particularly already knowing how to code has made the transition much easier. On top of that, a lot of the skills I’ve had to acquire during my time here are very much lab specific, so there wouldn’t be any real way for me to have received them before. Overall, SJC gave me more of the broad strokes mentality abilities while most of my time here has been about smaller tasks. I think that this day-to-day rote work has certainly been difficult in contrast to SJC; at the College, it’s fairly easy to follow curiosity without much worry about the costs, however, in a lab like this, we have to very precisely refine and justify any questions we have before following through on them. Professor Yu, in particular, is very focused on this front, always wanting clear justifications and explanations of any work we are doing, a sort of challenge which I think has helped me a great deal in being better in setting goals for my work.

Of course, it can be difficult and frustrating both to make what feels like no progress just trying out ideas and having them rejected or actually beginning on a project and needing to do all the

rote work to even get to the question itself, but I think those difficulties really are part of what ends up making this work enjoyable in the way it is: very little of what I’ve done here has been simply pointing and doing, but rather requires the sort of work that makes things genuinely rewarding.

The lab itself is a very supportive environment: everyone is willing to answer questions and lend help, time, data, etc. By the nature of the work, all of our projects end up intersecting and it always feels like people want to solve problems together. It is a great place to learn and grow, though it requires a great deal of internal motivation.

I will not be working at the EMK lab in the future, but I hope to find work in another neuroscience lab within the University of Chicago. Either way, it’s been a great learning experience for my future academic and career goals. I now think I could enjoy a cognitive science related career but would have to find a specific topic of study that really excites me to get past the many hurdles.

Andrew Selway ’24

Maryland Office of the Public Defender, Baltimore City Juvenile Justice Center

Baltimore, MD

During my time at the Office of the Public Defender I worked directly with lawyers to aid in trial preparation and received a front-row crash course into the practice of defending Baltimore youths whose fates are at the mercy of the justice system. I spent many hours reviewing Police Body Camera Footage and created timelines for lawyers of important occurrences during arrests and investigations. Furthermore, I analyzed discovery provided by the prosecutor before trial in order to better understand the state’s arguments against our clients. This discovery included social media posts, surveillance video and images taken by investigators.

A large part of my summer was spent using the text-based discussion and analysis skills I learned at St. John’s. The lawyer I worked closest with had other interns and I read and discussed Juvenile Case Law. We had long conversations about where these laws were applicable to our cases and also the broader social consequences of these laws. On top of this, one of my responsibilities was to read the petitions against our client and compare the counts with case law in order to discuss with the lawyers how to argue or bring to light the inapplicability of the charges.

Other responsibilities included interviewing clients either in the Juvenile Justice Center or in their homes. During these interviews I learned the clients desired outcomes and learned the client's perspectives and experiences from when they were arrested to their trial.

When I received this internship, I thought that I would be carrying out menial tasks like organizing files or sending emails, but instead it gave me front-line knowledge and experience of the legal profession. I was happy to be in the environment of the office and to witness the daily tasks of the lawyers. I was given an immense amount of responsibility and felt that the work I did directly influenced the cases I was engaged with. I spent a lot of time in courtrooms and feel that I have come away with a very strong understanding of how the Criminal Justice System works and what a potential career in the field looks like.

Jacob Sharpe ’27

Digital Publishing, St. John’s College Annapolis, MD

This summer, Mr. Lim and I, with Mr. Coleman as our mentor, worked at rejuvenating several of the college manuals that were in particular need of updating. As many St. John’s students already know, many of the manuals which enjoy regular use are rather difficult to read, being made up of poor-quality photocopies. In the first instance of this internship, we were tasked with teaching ourselves the LaTeX software, an opensource program that allows for remarkably easy typesetting of documents of any kind. My appreciation for the program has grown so much that were the requirements for this report not explicitly exclusionary of PDFs, I would’ve used LaTeX in the formatting of this paper.

When we started, we were given optical character recognition (OCR) scans of the Senior Math manuals and tasked with proofreading them. (Though we had the base manuals in hand, their plain text was not yet available for our use). This took up a good amount of time, but once we completed that task, we were thrown headfirst into learning LaTeX. We were given an elementary tutorial from our mentor, but when it came down to specific features we wanted to emulate from the original manual, such as fonts or advanced equations, we were on our own. Stack Exchange and “packages” (open-source tools made for giving the user greater control over specifics) became our best friends. Gradually, we worked through the math manuals, Mr. Lim taking the readings manual and me taking the notes one.

I should mention that not only did we have to learn a completely new method of formatting text, we also had to rapidly acquire a knack for LaTeX’s novel mode of representing equations. Although it saves time significantly when compared with how one does it in Google Docs (hence why LaTeX is indispensable in the professional fields of science and math), it is intimidating at first. For instance, I would represent 1 √2 in LaTeX as $\tfrac{1}{\sqrt{2}}$. Despite the great amount of effort demanded of us, we ultimately succeeded in gaining a formidable command of the program. Having a workmate on this project was crucial, as it allowed Mr. Lim to offer me suggestions when I was infuriated with code that wouldn’t run, and likewise allowed me to offer respite to Mr. Lim’s typesetting woes. This process of learning from scratch was a massive growth opportunity for me and an affirmation of my quick adaptability. My success resulting from my self-taught skills made my success feel even greater than if I took a dedicated class for LaTeX. In fact, we gained so much competency and worked so quickly we completed the assigned tasks ahead of schedule, resulting in our typesetting of four manuals instead of the expected two. In addition, we created a guidebook summarizing the information we learned over the past few months for future interns.

My work encouraged me to look at a text as a work of art by means of its outward appearance, not just through the ideas it contains. Despite the adage to never judge a book by its cover, it is nonetheless true that people do so, and for good reason. The outward appearance of a published document gives the reader an instantaneous sense of the effort and care put into it, from which can be drawn the respectability of the author and typesetter.

Not to say that I have hitherto never thought about making my essays visually appealing. My previous year at St. John’s has well acquainted me with the piece of work that are most word processors. In the final stages of my Freshman essay, hours were dedicated to scrutinizing the page numbering, policing the spacing of words, and ensuring the proper positioning of footnotes. LaTeX did all of these things automatically, which instantly made the program dear to my heart.

I had been well-prepared by my academic activities at St. John’s to appreciate the tools given by LaTeX and to recognize their utility, which I of course put into great use when I worked on the Senior Math manual. However, my status there was, for the most part, as an outsider who simply saw content and transferred it to a better medium. I hadn’t used the manual yet, and so I could only make inferences on what changes students would find useful. When I moved on to the Freshman Lab manual, however, I felt firmly convicted on what could be improved. In my first semester of my Freshman year, my lab tutorial bemoaned the layout and design of that manual; by the time I was invited to typeset it following the math manual, my mind was up to the brim with ideas of what needed to change. Apart from the illegible text, the residual page numbering from the scans made classroom discussions difficult, and the lack of font consistency gave it a sloppy feel. Needless to say, when I finally got to Observing Living Beings, I looked at it from the eyes and experience of a student. As a result, I consider that manual to be the magnum opus of my internship; I took a disaster which no one could speak well of and created a manual that students could comfortably use!

As previously mentioned, my interest in beautifying the documents I write has dramatically increased, and so have the tools I have at my disposal. In addition, this internship has for the first time made me consider seeking a career in publishing. Over the course of my time here, I’ve put a lot of time into studying fonts and made selections in accordance with the end-goal of an easily accessible and readable manual. I read articles about font legibility and ultimately decided on Times and Computer Modern for program texts. Additionally, my discussions with Mr. Coleman, Mr. Halper, and Mr. Yee gave me inspiration to toggle font modes between serif and sans-serif; I used them to smoothly discern between the contributions of program authors and tutors. I’m very pleased with the job I did on the manuals, and the opportunity to utilize my newfound talents on a book outside the sphere of college publications would excite me greatly.

Harrison Suire ’27

Episcopal School of Acadiana (ESA) Cade, LA & abroad in Greece and Italy

This summer, I interned as a teaching aide at my alma mater ESA, helping to create and teach the curriculum of their ESA Abroad program. Though the bulk of my hours were in the classroom and on the trip, my internship began mid-way through the spring semester. I kept in contact with my mentor Bill Wood, one of the two teachers leading the program, and we researched and discussed what direction we would take with the class to make the trip portion of the experience more valuable to the students.

When I returned to Louisiana, we had already compiled a packet of passages from various authors from Ancient Greece, Imperial Rome, Renaissance Florence, and Medieval Meteoric Monasteries. We often met in the days leading up to the week of class to discuss specifics and my in-class role. As I was a rising sophomore at St. John’s, I had become familiar with not only the Greek texts that dominated a large portion of the class’s materials (including Herodotus, Thucydides, Plato, Aristotle, and Sophocles) but also the language in which they were written. My growing education at St. John’s allowed me to offer insight into the original Greek and its nuances of meaning. I also spent time each day giving a crash course on the language itself, teaching the Greek alphabet, Ancient Greek pronunciations, and more than twenty important and recognizable Greek vocabulary words.

The class consisted of two teachers, six students, and me. The classroom dynamic was wonderful. Students were encouraged to voice their thoughts in the discussions as much as possible. I found it quite enjoyable to work with my former teachers as colleagues, and it felt great to offer my own knowledge and opinions to help the students grow intellectually as well.

The trip portion of the internship was more about supervising and helping the students as a teacher would on a field trip as a chaperone. However, we still met every day in our downtime to discuss how our class curriculum helped us see Greece and Italy with more discerning eyes. Throughout the trip, the students were required to keep a daily journal and answer up to two prompts pertaining to each day’s activities. At the end of the trip they were asked to write a reflective paper and fill in any missing prompts they’d failed to write abroad. I was given the task of compiling a list of every prompt we’d discussed, create a few more, and give instructions on various methods of how to turn in their assignments digitally, which became complicated as their journals were all physical and the students had no experience transferring physical to digital without transcribing.

This led to the final portion of my internship. My colleagues and I each individually thoroughly read and contemplated each student’s journal and essay and offered comments. Then we gave a final grade for their course-wide efforts and observable growth.

As a whole, the internship was both enjoyable and insightful. I had entertained the idea of becoming a teacher in middle and high school because I appreciated how much a great teacher can benefit a student. Since then, I have begun to wonder what being a teacher entails, especially after seeing other unique schools, like St. John’s. After participating in this program as a teaching assistant, I see that there is not a single thing that a teacher is, but I believe that I can become one if I continue down this path, and maybe even a great one. I would love to return to ESA in the future as a teacher rather than a student, and now I know that it is possible.

Christoper Thomas ’24

St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology

Steubenville, OH

This summer I joined the St. Paul Center for Biblical Theology’s Events Team as an intern. My responsibilities were varied but included planning for, setting up, and managing the St. Paul Center’s mobile bookstore as it traveled to various conferences. It likewise involved standing ready to respond to arising needs at the conferences and events that the St. Paul Center itself hosted. My hope for the summer was that this work would bring me into the milieu of the academic theology world and give me a chance, also, to spend some time in an unexpectedly thriving small, post-industrial town in rural Ohio, Steubenville, which had caught my attention.

I had imagined that I would not mind doing work which I expected to be simple but varied setting up book stands, selling books, organizing warehouse space, doing preparatory computer work, making calls, etc. if it brought me into an environment I wanted to be in. But the summer helped me realize that eight hours a day is a long time to do work whose intrinsic character has little positive appeal to me, even if I am in a great local community! My education at St. John’s had kindled in me an appetite for a sort of excellence that just was not possible in the work I was doing. In this way, it was both a gift and a burden, leaving me restless of heart because I knew I was made for more than what I was doing day-to-day. My work did give me a glimpse at academic theology, which I appreciated, but I was not able to spend a large amount of my time actually learning or studying theology. I got an even better look, however, at the mainstays of contemporary, corporate work, since the St. Paul Center is primarily a publishing company: work in the fields of accounting, marketing, development, web design, etc. My summer left me particularly repulsed by the dreariness of the physical environment in which these professions take place and the necessity of sitting at a computer for eight hours a day to undertake them. I now know that I would like to stay far from the mainstream corporate environment. This realization was coupled with an unexpected encounter with a skilled carpenter, which has stirred in me an attraction to work in which body and mind might be used together for the elevation of our physical environment. I currently plan to take a timber framing course in Michigan this fall with a look to timber framing apprenticeships afterwards if the work continues to appeal to me in the way it does now.

The restlessness of heart I experienced in my unchallenging work as a result of my St. John’s education also led to great conversations with my coworkers. These were generally good people who believed that corporate work might be lackluster in some ways but that it was something that we nonetheless needed to submit to. My education allowed me to ask rousing questions, to expand historical perspectives, and to help reignite a sense of wonder before the world and a hope for what life could become. I think my coworkers appreciated it! It helped me realize what

a gift it was to spend four years at a college which gave us a chance to think about more important questions than those regarding immediate financial concerns.

A friend of mine once said that the best thing that could come out of a summer internship was a recognition of one’s vocation in the field of the internship, and the second best thing that could come of one is a recognition that your vocation is not in the field you had once imagined it could be. I am here in the latter camp, but I am seriously grateful to the Hodson Trust for enabling me to have such a recognition. The summer stipend allowed me to look closely at the corporate work environment without getting there the long way (through further schooling or training) to only then realize that I wanted no part in it. Again, it was my education at St. John’s that awoke in me the yearnings that drive me forwards now and keep me from contentment with work that is not in accord with my nature. I am not sure yet where I will end up, but I can see my next step, and I am excited to pursue it.

Polina Vatralskaia ’26

Astrakhan Museum-Reserve, Archeoterra Research Center

Astrakhan,

Russia

I spent the summer as an intern at the Astrakhan Archeological Expedition which has set its aim at finding and researching the settlements of Khazar people by using historical maps and writings as well as an archeological field research.

My responsibilities were split between the manual physical work, such as digging up sorting, and cleaning the findings, and creative work, such as writing reports on the findings and the general course of the expedition, researching the literature, and managing volunteers.

My experience of taking St. John's College Laboratory class made it much easier and familiar to work with huge amounts of scientific data, extract and compare relevant information from both the old sources and our own research in a short period of time. Moreover, I found it very rewarding to apply the seminar etiquette to our daily debates with historians in an attempt to understand the value and meaning of the objects and people remains we discovered.

The expedition in general rejuvenated my love for history and explained that archeology is going to be an essential science even in a thousand years from now because even with a constant documentation of modern life through the internet, it is important to have a second perspective on a historical period. The 30th century scientists will be reading our books and looking at the leftovers of our food and houses to understand the differences between the lives of common people and government and establish their perspectives on one another, just like I have been doing for the last couple of months with Khazars.

In addition to that, I really enjoyed the fact that the whole scientific crew has been living, eating, and working together. It made me realize that community is an important factor in my search for a future job. Good relationships and familiarity among the colleagues makes them more reliable and motivated to work, as well as eliminating unnecessary formalities which hinder it.

However, the excess of work place equality has a bad side the lack of resource management. It was unexpected to see professors and magistrates using a shovel and a brush among the volunteers since this work is physical and requires no knowledge. Eventually, while the volunteers were resting after a hard day, the tired researchers would end up doing the analysis right after the dig, which was an inefficient use of their skill and qualification.

Overall, the expedition has reached its goal of discovering an ancient city, while I have discovered and explored my work place needs and preferences: I see my future job having a tight community with a clear task division, open access to an archive or a library with relevant information, a strict provisional schedule with general goals and progress, and, most importantly, unending process of learning and informational exchange among the younger and older colleagues.

And while our findings are being processed by the Astrakhan Museum, I am going to continue my journey in archeology together with one of my new colleagues who has offered me a spot in his remote research on South Russian history.

Photo: human bones, dated from the 6th century (which marks the end of the antiquity) of our Era and belong to Khazars.

Jack Webb ’26 Speech and Language Lab, University of Oregon Eugene, OR

This summer I interned at the Speech and Language Lab at the University of Oregon, which researches the connection between the communicative structure of language and the motor acts of speech from an experimental and developmental perspective. I helped with a number of the lab’s research projects: the main one has to do with potential connections between the syntactical structure of utterances and the natural rhythm of pauses and breaths in speech, and especially with how they develop in childhood and adolescence.

The lab has recorded dozens of study participants, children and adults, speaking in response to narrative and expository prompts meaning, they were asked to tell a story (summarize a Pingu video they just watched), and to explain something (how to play their favorite game). The next stage is to process the dozens of hours of audio: transcribe it, analyze its syntactical structure, and precisely mark the boundaries of sentences, pauses, and breaths. This stage is the most laborious; I spent more of my time on it than anything else, and it will not be finished for perhaps a year after I’m gone. I also researched theories of topic structures in the functionalist linguistic literature, and looked into how the lab should investigate the possible role of topic/comment structures in prosodic rhythm.

I ran study participants through the lab’s experiments, which required me to first take six hours of training in the ethics of scientific research involving human subjects. Most of the issues involved medical experimentation, and thus was not applicable to our work of recording people telling stories, but it was nonetheless all good to know. I also designed and ran an activity about sociolinguistics and dialectal diversity for a high school summer camp, which will be reused in coming years.

The mission of this lab is similar to that of St. John’s, the cultivation of science and understanding. Although the methods of the two are radically different, St. John’s has given me habits and knowledge that were useful to me in the lab. From my education I’ve received skills in reading diverse difficult texts with an eye for context and overall structure, which proved extremely helpful in dealing with research literature. From St. John’s I’ve also gained a perspective that understanding is difficult and requires both great care and radical intellectual openness, which allowed me to better appreciate the lab’s rigorous experimental methods. While I’m proud of what I’ve learned and glad that I came here this summer, I’ve learned that studies in linguistics, especially the functionalist and cognitive subfields, are not my passion. While I’ve been here, however, I have rediscovered a passion for mathematics, which may take me somewhere in the future I recall reading a paper by the lab director, Dr. Redford, in which she proposed a model for understanding speech motor control based on an application of graph theory in 12-dimensional fields. To understand that work better, I started learning my calculus in my spare time, but over the course of weeks I got deep enough in the math that I forgot about the original paper.

I appreciated how everyone in the lab is there because they care about what they’re studying. Some in the lab are paid and some are not, but all are there to study language. The other side, though, is that because everyone is doing what they love, they can forget about the lab’s current goals; that’s not a great problem, though, as long as there aren’t any pressing deadlines. The leader of the lab was impressively busy, but cared about our development and made time to work with us. At any one time, there would be three to five of us in the lab, working together or separately. The kind of person who is interested in linguistics research is usually an introvert, so the lab was happily quiet. All the people there, even the other undergrads, are knowledgeable and experienced. Although I don’t foresee doing future work in linguistics research, I’ve now seen firsthand what beautiful work research and teaching is, and I’d like to make some kind of career in it.

Luke Widenhouse ‘25

This summer, I had the opportunity to work as a research intern at the Yorktown Institute, a think tank in Washington D.C. specializing in American national security and defense policy. I assisted with Yorktown's research on the defense budget and military force posture and modernization.

My work consisted mostly in analyzing open-source information and disseminating it into reports, which would then be briefed to senior Yorktown leaders. I also helped to edit pieces that Yorktown leaders would publish in various media outlets. For example, I helped to track military developments in the Taiwan Strait in the early part of the summer when China began a series of exercises in response to the country's presidential inauguration.

The most exciting part of the summer was definitely having the opportunity to be published in RealClearDefense, the national security and foreign policy subsidiary of RealClearPolitics. I argued that the U.S. is insufficiently prepared to deal with the threat posed by Russia's development of a nuclear-armed anti-satellite weapon and that the military should be exercising denied space operations. I came in with a strong interest in defense policy, particularly relating to force structure and resourcing, and came out with only a greater interest in those issues, as well as a continued eagerness to work on solving them as a career. There was not a single negative experience that I can think of.

During the summer, I had the opportunity to work alongside another summer research intern who was focused mainly on economic, trade, and cultural issues in the Indo-Pacific. We had an extraordinarily positive work dynamic, and our research helped us produce reports that bridged a variety of different aspects of American national security priorities in one of the most consequential regions in the world.

Ultimately, the experience was an incredible opportunity to do interesting work on something that I am extraordinarily passionate about. I would absolutely consider going back to work at the Yorktown Institute after my graduation but would be equally excited about any other similar opportunities out there.

Amha Worku ’27

Kana Television

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

In my internship at Kana Television, I worked closely with the creative team, participating in various projects and gaining first-hand experience in digital content creation, graphic design, and multimedia production. I worked alongside a graphic designer and video editor. He taught me how to create compelling and striking posters using Adobe Photoshop. He then guided me into understanding the intricacies behind video editing, which can easily go unnoticed. A big project that we worked on was creating promotion videos and posters for a boxing event which Kana would be televising. Another project, which I greatly enjoyed, was promoting a local art gallery. This gave me the opportunity to not only refine my skills in graphic design but to better understand what goes into an art gallery it was an enlightening experience.

It’s a wonder how, though I had spent a year in seminars and tutorials, I was ignorant of the good effects they had had on me. Immersing myself in an environment beyond the confines of St. John’s revealed to me just how much my attitude with others changed this year. I was able to speak with colleagues with an openness to learn; my willingness to ask others for help when I was stuck was no longer stunted by pride. The demands St. John’s put on me, as a student, to engage in the conversation even if it was just to share my own confusion intensified my sincerity and honesty when engaging in conversations with others. Furthermore, the rigor of the classes, not only in terms of the quantity of the work but also of the quality, propelled me towards building more efficient ways to study and manage my time. This efficiency translated over into my work-habits at my internship, leading me to finish projects quicker without sacrificing quality.

I had decided to intern at Kana for two reasons: I wanted to explore if graphic design could be a profession I would be interested in; and I was hoping to use my skills to assuage my country, since Kana is a beloved staple of Ethiopia. I have engaged in fine arts for a great part of my life, and I feel that if I were to pursue a profession within the field of art, I would likely not go into the branch of graphic design. The internship showed me that for the most part, graphic design at least the graphic design I was introduced to is concerned with how to master the use of Adobe products. Of course, there is still art involved: I needed to be able to discern and create aesthetically pleasing formats for posters and videos; and I also observed some of my colleagues working on animated shows, which required a high degree of competency in drawing and painting. However, I noticed that the pleasure I had when producing art through traditional media (graphite, charcoal, oil paint, etc.) was greater than the pleasure I had when using screens and mouses. I was surprised, however, by how much more I learned about art through this internship, ranging from color theory to breaking down complex objects into simple shapes. I

am also elated to have learned how to use Adobe products, since they will be vital to an array of fields I’m still interested in pursuing.

Though I realized that graphic design isn’t a profession I want to pursue, I do hope that I can have colleagues like the ones I had for this internship. They were very welcoming to me and were more than happy to familiarize me with the work I had to do. Beyond things directly related to work, they shared with me their experiences in the field of graphic design, good and bad. Their advice on how to go about acquiring a job went beyond graphic design, which I’m sure will help me later in life. Though my colleagues were great, I didn’t greatly enjoy the workplace itself. Since it’s a multimedia production company, there were a great deal of computers and speakers which made the workplace noisy and hectic at times. The workplace sometimes also felt disconnected since everyone would be on their respective computers, but that isn’t a problem only this workplace has, but almost all multimedia production companies.

Although the internship at Kana enlightened me in many respects, I cannot see myself working there in the future. When working with the art gallery for promotions, my eyes were revealed to a prospective profession which I believe I would greatly enjoy: art curation. I am thankful to have had the opportunity to intern at Kana, since in many ways, I have come out not only understanding the value the St. John’s education and community has in the real-world, but also understanding which professions may or may not be for my disposition.

Juliann Yoder ‘25

University of Liverpool: Institute of Irish Studies & University of Manchester: The Engine Room

Liverpool and Southport, UK

My internship had dual roles: one placement with Dr. Eleanor Lybeck in the Institute of Irish Studies in the University of Liverpool, and the other with Dr. Eric Lybeck of Manchester University, in The Engine Room. Two days a week, I worked in the Irish institute: one day I would commute into the institute to perform secretarial tasks under the institute administrators, including office organization, filing, subtitling, and document transcription; the other weekly day, I worked with the Delaney manuscripts, reading and summarizing the documents, and submitting them for the Institute’s archive. In this role, I was thankful for the writing skills I have cultivated at St. Johns, both in essays and in interpersonal affairs with admin, and my experience at the reception desk and giving tours in the admissions office.

The other three days a week, I worked with Eric in the Engine room, where my duties varied widely, from making coffee and giving tours, to theory-crafting and collaborating on projects, such as a historical online shop, and a vintage game room. My primary duty within the engine room was managing the company social media, creating and publishing social media marketing content, and organizing our hosted events, such as community lectures, language classes, waltz classes, etc. The most valuable skill I brought to this role, and the one I think most greatly grew over the summer, was the discussion and co-learning practice I have had in class the ability to freely and personably take part in group discussions and company meetings about group projects, local politics, and, on a more personal level, to connect and empathize with the problems presented by locals that we, at the Engine Room, were trying address in our community outreach programs and classes.

My plans for future studies gained clarification during my experiences this summer, especially in the time I spent with the amazing faculty of the Irish Institute in Liverpool. I received a wealth of information about applying to grad school programs and getting funding in the UK, as well as suggestions and encouragement towards specific programs and institutions. I got to talk and correspond with professors who are deeply passionate and proud of their historical and cultural research, which reignited my desire to join their ranks one day. I also realized, over the summer, especially during my time as a student ambassador in the Beckett festival, how much I loved hearing and writing the life-stories of others. One of my favorite experiences of the internship was helping to host and then transcribe the talk given by photographer John Minihan, as he described his fascinating encounters with Samual Beckett the current and local history of cultural figures I had been working with over the duration of the Beckett festival came alive, in the vivid memory of this intriguing man. Although I only met him for a short time, I realized what a wealth of

experience and history I can learn from many figures like him, as they pass their living memories on to the next generation, and what fascinating biographical research is open there.

I was truly lucky to meet so many amazing co-workers and friends over the summer, foremost among them Eric and Eleanor, who opened their house and their beautiful family to me. I was also so fortunate to meet as many faculty of the Irish Institute as I did, as well as the Irish ambassador and the faculty of Culture Ireland, at their biannual meeting which I attended in London. A more ideal internship setting in the University of Liverpool, with its connections and facilities, could not have been asked for. In Southport, the location and project of the Engine Room, revitalizing an enormous, beautiful, and mostly abandoned Victorian shopping arcade, was an inspiring and totally unique setting for a summer of work experience. The people in the community projects were warm, passionate, and welcoming what is developing there is really an exciting and one-of-a-kind project. The project’s strengths, though, also came with its weaknesses while in its exciting and rapidly expanding opening stages, since the Engine Room first opened its doors in March, there was such a vast variety of side-projects and new ideas to work in, that it could be difficult to narrow down and put into effect a singular project. The quickly morphing and adaptive plans around the doors opened or closed by the town council could be difficult to keep up with. That being said, I cannot wait to see what a bit more time and development of the project brings in Southport, and I have been assured by Eric that I would be welcome to return and continue work in the Engine Room after graduation. Especially if I apply for graduate programs in the UK, I would definitely consider taking him up on this offer.

Thank you again for this incredible opportunity: allowing me to form amazing connections and a summer of beautiful memories.

Nathan Zewdie ’27

Ultimate Plan PLC

Addis Ababa, Ethiopia

My internship experience over the first three weeks has been a comprehensive blend of practical onsite learning, theoretical study, and skill development in architectural design. The journey began with an immersion into the core principles of architecture, sketching, and realworld application through site visits and progressed into more advanced areas like historical analysis of architectural sketches and AutoCAD training.

The initial week of my internship was primarily focused on laying the groundwork for understanding basic architectural design and sketching. This period was marked by intensive hands-on practice, where I created 5-10 compositions of joint shapes such as cylinders, cubes, cuboids, and pyramids every day (fig.1,2).

This exercise was crucial in familiarizing myself with the construction and spatial relationships of these fundamental forms. To challenge myself further, I incorporated various shading techniques and perspective shots, which added depth and realism to my sketches. A significant highlight of the first week was my first onsite visit to a real estate construction project (figs.3,4,5).

This experience provided invaluable practical insights and an opportunity to engage directly with professionals in the field. During the visit, I interacted with the senior architect and designer, who explained the AutoCAD plans for the building's different floors. I was able to identify key issues, such as the ramp leading to the garage not meeting the required 2-meter clearance for vehicle access. The proposed solution involved extending the ramp’s inlet towards the street and lowering the outlet height. Another issue I observed was a miscommunication between the architects and structural engineers, resulting in an inconveniently small space on the first floor. The resolution was to convert this space into a mini garden-terrace.

These experiences underscored the importance of on-site supervision and effective communication between the development and executive departments which, I felt, nicely complemented the communication and critical thinking skills that I developed in the seminar classroom. They also highlighted the need for adaptability and problem-solving skills in realworld scenarios. Additionally, my mentor, Shegaw, provided me with books and PDFs that served as introductory materials for architectural study, along with demonstrations of specific sketch techniques and design tactics, further enriching my foundational knowledge. Keeping an open mind when processing all of the material he passed onto me was a bit taxing to keep up with initially. However, I kept pace nearing the end of the first week.

I was quite taken by Michelangelo Buonarroti’s contributions to architecture’s historical progression. His sketches showcased a blend of artistic expression and technical precision, reflecting his dual expertise as a sculptor and architect. Studying his works reinforced the importance of artistic creativity and technical skill in architectural design. Understanding the foundations of Euclid’s elements provided with the necessary historical perspective on the evolution of architectural design and also emphasized the significance of sketching in the conceptualization and development process. Starting from but a line.

One of the biggest hinderances to my work was the challenges of the language barrier. In terms of workplace experience itself, the office staff, though mostly reserved, were always polite and engaging. However, my proficiency in Amharic being on a social level and not a professional communication level severely handicapped my efforts to understand certain instructions. Despite these difficulties, with the help of my supervisor who is bilingual but only to the same degree that I was, I made diligent efforts to complete my tasks. While the experience emphasized the importance of perseverance and adaptability in a professional environment, it also served as an illumination of my current capacities. My Amharic is simply not up to par to communicate at the professional level. Therefore, if Ultimate Plan plc. is where I wish to work in the future there is more work to be done on my end.

A significant milestone during this period was my introduction to AutoCAD. Initially, I focused on familiarizing myself with the basic interface and tools of the software. This involved learning how to navigate AutoCAD, understanding the different types of drawing tools available, and practicing basic commands such as line, circle, and rectangle. This foundational training was essential in preparing me for the more technical and critical part of creation and “making” that I sought after. Though very fascinating to me I had hoped to be working more with the engineering department on calculations, simulations and predicted feasibility of the projects at hand. Perhaps this is indicative that I may want to pursue a more technical field than architecture leaning more towards the nature of engineering.

Henry Zheng, ’24

United States Department of Agriculture

In partnership with the Conference of Asian-Pacific American Leadership Washington, D.C.

During the summer of 2024, I had the privilege of enhancing my internship experience through the Conference of Asian-Pacific American Leadership (CAPAL) Internship Program in partnership with the U.S. Dept. of Agriculture, Animal and Health Inspection Service (USDA-APHIS). This was a moment of great accomplishment, as both undergraduate and graduate students, including myself, were offered the unique opportunity to work within various affiliated agencies, organizations, and companies in the public service sector throughout the United States. Specifically, I was assigned as one of the interns at USDA-APHIS’s National Animal Disease Traceability and Veterinary Accreditation Center (NADTVAC) working alongside the Veterinary Services (VS) Strategy and Policy team located at different buildings in Washington D.C., Colorado, Iowa, and Maryland.

My primary responsibilities included planning and coordinating special projects for directors and supervisors on program operations, leading development and improvement policy processes associated with making and communicating decisions on animal health and trade, maintaining technical and program tools, and other administrative tasks such as preparing reports and reviewing code. I also had the chance to receive training and networking opportunities while organizing a Community Action Project (CAP) with a few other interns to develop a plan for increasing recruitment and retention rates at a non-profit organization known as Asian American LEAD.

At the heart of St. John’s College, the fundamental lessons that taught me how to be a great reader and thinker really resonated with my internship work. I was left with questions that were central to why I had pursued the public service path: the question of what it means to be a St. John’s College alumnus in public service, how reading highly comprehensive texts from Euclid, Shakespeare, Poetry, and Georg Cantor could connect to reading programming language such as JavaScript and Python, why questions are essentially important to ask in all aspects of the career, and what it means to begin a conversation on modern policies, politics, and government while tracing back political and philosophical historians such as Thucydides and Tocqueville. As I worked on reviewing several training modules from the National Veterinarian Accreditation Program (NVAP), I recalled how my lessons in senior and freshman Biology on Genetics and Cell Microbiology were utilized to provide feedback on correcting information regarding DNA testing and cell background of animal diseases.

Looking ahead to my post-graduate experience at St. John’s College, I am excited to continue working as an intern at USDA-APHIS. I also hope to inspire others at the college to pursue similar opportunities. This opportunity could become a possible place for future employment, given that it could match my career goals and their mission to serve the public and the law.

Overall, without the generous support and opportunity offered by the Hodson Trust, I would not have had the chance to meet with the fantastic co-workers and supervisors who helped me further understand my career goal as a prospective government employee, a part-time educator, and a potential attorney in the future. At the internship, I was able to meet a wide range of highly specialized experts across the United States. I also learned from them how to further ask questions, communicate with others, and carefully read different assignments given to me, which are skills all Johnnies must acquire as they build their educational experience. Having this experience could help me develop more relationships with the government, organizations, and companies across the globe while improving the skills necessary for future employment.