I did my internship with a general contracting company called JPC Enterprises. In working for JPC I got to help with things like drywalling, framing, and of course some post hole digging and cleaning. During my work days I spent a lot of time learning about engineering and construction stuff from Mario, Alex, Joe, and my boss John. Alex and Joe are both really good framers and they taught me quite a bit about laying out studs in a wall properly and just framing in general. Mario can honestly do just about anything from painting to drywall, but his bread and butter is finnish carpentry. My mentor, John’s, role in all of this was to make sure everyone’s working like a well oiled machine and to give me advice on anything from construction stuff to work ethic.
In fact the number one takeaway from this internship is work ethic. Even though I got to learn both engineering concepts and how to work on my hands. Work ethic was still easily the number one takeaway for one simple reason: we had a lot of work to do. There was always an impending deadline, we were always expected to do perfect work, and on top of that sometimes a subcontractor wouldn’t do their job or the client would ask us to do something else with no warning. All of this essentially meant that I had to get a lot done very well and in very little time. This work ethic is an amazing skill that I can apply to anything from other jobs to highschool and college level studies. |
Because I have to get a lot done in a short amount of time it took something else other than just work ethic. I needed to use some critical thinking skills to figure out what the most important thing I could be doing is and how I can do that task the most efficiently. The next 21st century skill that I had to use and work on is simple communication skills. Since I'm a bit of a quiet person this part didn't come very naturally to me, especially since at the start of my internship I didn't really know my coworkers all that well so I didn't talk all that much, but by the end of my internship I was much better at communication. And last but certainly not least I had to use perseverance. This job was pretty difficult at times; at times there were some pretty tall orders in terms of what had to be done in a day to make sure we're on schedule.
While I did just complain a lot about workload and how much I had to do in such a short time, workload wasn’t actually the biggest challenge of this internship. The biggest challenge had to be that I was learning on the job. This hit me especially hard because, while I’m sure being inexperienced at something would stress anyone out, I feel like this was more difficult for me in particular. This is in large part because I really really don’t want to mess anything up and when I don’t know what I’m doing I feel like there’s a very real and very frightening possibility of messing something up. It was hugely difficult to break myself from this mindset.
While this trial by fire wasn't easy I still got to learn a ton of stuff about practical engineering concepts. While I did drywall and painting, which admittedly don’t have a lot to do with engineering, I learned about building stairs and how to properly lay out studs in a wall sixteen inches on center. I also got to learn all about foundations and concrete pours. Most concrete pours, especially ones that will have to withstand a lot of weight are made with steel supports inside of the poured concrete. These supports can range from anything between chicken wire for small pours, to a lot of steel rebar for the foundations of buildings. After having learned all of that and so much more I’d definitely say that I met my original internship goles!
Everything I learned will certainly serve to help me in life after high school. Having to deal with very challenging workloads helped me figure out how to deal with a bunch of different things being thrown at me all at once (something I struggle with quite a bit). In addition to that, part of this internship was done while I was attending both high school classes and college classes so I got to learn how to balance my time between my academic studies and work. Finding this balance is extremely important in college, so much so that Colorado School of Mines considers this when determining whether or not to accept applications. On that note I’m almost certain that any job that I work in college will be easier and less demanding than my summer internship. Seriously, any fast food or retail job is gonna be a piece of cake compared to this. This internship was truly an invaluable experience to me.
While I did just complain a lot about workload and how much I had to do in such a short time, workload wasn’t actually the biggest challenge of this internship. The biggest challenge had to be that I was learning on the job. This hit me especially hard because, while I’m sure being inexperienced at something would stress anyone out, I feel like this was more difficult for me in particular. This is in large part because I really really don’t want to mess anything up and when I don’t know what I’m doing I feel like there’s a very real and very frightening possibility of messing something up. It was hugely difficult to break myself from this mindset.
While this trial by fire wasn't easy I still got to learn a ton of stuff about practical engineering concepts. While I did drywall and painting, which admittedly don’t have a lot to do with engineering, I learned about building stairs and how to properly lay out studs in a wall sixteen inches on center. I also got to learn all about foundations and concrete pours. Most concrete pours, especially ones that will have to withstand a lot of weight are made with steel supports inside of the poured concrete. These supports can range from anything between chicken wire for small pours, to a lot of steel rebar for the foundations of buildings. After having learned all of that and so much more I’d definitely say that I met my original internship goles!
Everything I learned will certainly serve to help me in life after high school. Having to deal with very challenging workloads helped me figure out how to deal with a bunch of different things being thrown at me all at once (something I struggle with quite a bit). In addition to that, part of this internship was done while I was attending both high school classes and college classes so I got to learn how to balance my time between my academic studies and work. Finding this balance is extremely important in college, so much so that Colorado School of Mines considers this when determining whether or not to accept applications. On that note I’m almost certain that any job that I work in college will be easier and less demanding than my summer internship. Seriously, any fast food or retail job is gonna be a piece of cake compared to this. This internship was truly an invaluable experience to me.