Happy Monday!
I can’t believe that I have already reached the midpoint of my internship position at Students For Education Reform! The past month has been at once overwhelming and exhilarating, frustrating and inspiring, challenging and simple. I have learned so much from my coworkers and also from myself, but at the same time I feel like there is so much left to accomplish. In that spirit, I have been reflecting on all of the goals that I set for myself at the beginning of this internship and honestly examining how I have grown since then.
Two of my internship goals – related to time management and community connections for SFER Tulane – should have been accomplished by June 30th. My time management system has certainly developed; however I still feel as if it could use some work. I am currently using two agendas, Google Drive, and a new app called Asana to organize all of my tasks. It can be challenging on occasion to coordinate all of that, so I am working on streamlining that process. SFER is very goal-oriented, which has helped me stay on track with my personal goals and create a more effective system of tracking my progress. Here is a screenshot of Asana, the app that we are currently using to track our individual goals:
I am just a little bit addicted – it has been oddly fun to figure out how the app works and put in all of my goals!
My other goal related to making connections to community organizations in New Orleans for SFER Tulane, so that we can come in to this school year with strong community relations from which we can find volunteer opportunities, remain engaged in the education sphere in NOLA, and host education-related events with these organizations. I have accomplished this goal by connecting with Orleans Public Education Network, Vietnamese American Young Leaders Association, and Urban League College Track. All three of these organizations are doing incredible work in the New Orleans education and advocacy sphere, and I am so excited to have the chance to partner with them through SFER Tulane.
Another of my goals related to reaching out to politicians both in Boston and in New Orleans in an effort to create connections to the policy aspect of education reform. This is an area where I have faltered; in Boston our coalition has yet to focus on politician outreach and in Louisiana we are still in the research stage and have not chosen representatives with whom we can forge connections. I hope to focus on this in the last few weeks of this internship, as I feel that politician outreach is an important skill to have both for my future and for the future of SFER Tulane and the Louisiana coalition.
Outreach to politicians and media has always made me somewhat nervous, as I am never sure if they will be interested in the opinions of a 19-year-old New Orleans transplant that is still navigating the broad sector of education reform in the area. This is something that I have been trying to overcome through this position, and I have learned that I have to let go of these concerns in order to reach out, and what comes from that first contact often surprises me. I hope to continue growing in this area of my goals; by the end of the summer I want to be able to call politicians with all the confidence of a seasoned activist (okay, maybe not quite that much confidence, but somewhere near that level!).
I recently wrote a post for SFER’s blog about the recent news surrounding Common Core in Louisiana, and I was asked to craft the post into an op-ed for a New Orleans newspaper by the national office. I had no idea how to start – I have never written an op-ed before and I was not sure that my knowledge of Louisiana schools was profound enough to be able to produce a relevant piece. I have overcome my initial concerns, though, and am now working with SFER’s media team and hopefully some Tulane students that went through the Louisiana school system to craft a powerful op-ed on Common Core and the political item that it has become in our state. This kind of work is exactly what I want to be doing with SFER – challenging, collaborative, and impactful. I will keep y’all updated on the progress of the op-ed!
In summary, I am in a good place with my internship right now. I still want to accomplish so much, but I am happy with the progress that I (and the rest of the SFER MA team) have made thus far. And on that note, doing all of this work about New Orleans and SFER Tulane has made me incredibly excited for the year to come!