Silicon Valley Council of Nonprofits
Majors: Economics and Psychology
Home Town: Cupertino, CA
Interests: Dancing, cooking, volunteering
Organization: Silicon Valley Council of Nonprofits
Give a brief summary of your responsibilities/tasks in the internship.
My main responsibilities were to develop a social media plan using networks such as Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn. I created a four-week plan that also incorporated a brand new blog that I got up and running. I scheduled and wrote all social media posts for SVCN and created marketing and advertising material and collateral to promote their events and trainings. I managed changes for the website and updated the calendar of events. I created a promotional video for Funding Your Impact Summit – a large fundraising conference with over 200 guests. I also assisted in the re-organization of the Salesforce database, entered in and created reports for Speaker evaluations from FYI, and put together things like packets for attendees of FYI or welcome packages for new members. I also handled a lot of the social media, marketing material, and website changes for the Aging Services Collaborative, an organization focused on empowering senior members of society, that SVCN recently took over.
How do you think you made positive contributions to the department/organization?
I redesigned their whole email campaigns. At SVCN, we used MailChimp, a tool for creating attractive emails to send to large groups of people, and in the past, the emails were very plain and simple. However, once I got the responsibility of creating promotional emails to send out to members, I researched examples of attention-grabbing emails and changed the whole design of the emails. I used Canva, an online tool to create marketing material, to make flashier emails that people seemed to respond to well. I also created SVCN’s first promotional video and had the idea to start making videos. I also helped start up the blog and overall served as a general assistant for anyone in the organization. I really ended up “wearing many hats” in this position.
How did this experience enhance or connect to what you are learning in your LSB or other courses?
The biggest way in which the internship related to my academic work was probably when I created reports for the speakers from the conference. This was probably most related to a course I’ve taken on data analysis since I had to use Excel and find the best ways to display the data in a clear and effective way. Overall, many of the ways that my internship related to my coursework was through the development of skills I have used in class, as opposed to a direct relation to the actual material I’ve learned in courses. For example, this internship helped me develop creativity, communication, teamwork, and organization skills, which I certainly use in class, especially in group projects, but none of the work I did was very relevant to the material I study in my Economics or Psychology courses.
What was the most beneficial aspect of this experience for you?
The most beneficial aspect was probably how much it showed me what I like and don’t like, which really helped me narrow down future career options. It was great to be able to work in a small, nonprofit organization, and not just because I felt I was applying skills in a way that helps benefit the community, but also because working in a small organization is a great way to observe an organization as a whole, to explore departments you may not necessarily be a part of, and to take on larger responsibilities. I was also able to take on more responsibilities since the full-time staff was so small and therefore had a lot of work to delegate to us. I also learned what it’s like to work in a small organization with a small staff.