The End: Rachel

Looking over the past 6 months and thinking about everything that has gone on throughout this internship, I honestly can not believe that it is coming to an end. This semester flew, for so many reasons, and the fact that my freshman year is coming to a close really makes me think and reflect. With this internship, well, I am just so glad that I had the opportunity to do it. Having the chance to meet so many students that I don't think I would ever have the pleasure to meet, taking on new responsibilities, and playing a leadership and mediator role with planning events. I know that I grew from this internship. Coming into it I was a leader, yes, but never one to really work to plan events and get people to come together. I wanted to be the person to support those people but never have been put in the situation that would leave me to coordinate events. I can definitely say that it is a lot more work than one would think, even for small weekly events. Thinking about others interests and how to get people to first know about the event and then actually want to come is a huge aspect of this. For me, though, it was really rewarding. I feel like I learned so much about the importance of the Intensive English Program here at UNL. It also put into perspective the idea of foreign people on campus. Since I plan on being the student that is the 'foreigner' on campus for a majority of my college career, being able to interact and ask questions of those here at UNL made me a lot more reassured about my future experiences. It showed me that it isn't all that scary being someplace where you really have no idea what is going on and we are adaptable and able to learn. It put learning languages into perspective for me and the amount of differences between language based off of cultural differences. And most importantly, I made some new friends. I go eat lunch with my Egyptian friend almost once a week and I have learned so much from her. I made some Arab friends that I sit down just to talk to on a regular basis. And of course my Chinese friends that attempt to help me with my Chinese. I just loved this opportunity. I know that it probably made a bigger difference and impact to me than the IEP students because in reality, I was the one that was really learning through it all. I loved it. The opportunity was one that I will remember and value and I am very excited to see what the next set of interns do with this internship!