First off, I have to say I’m very disappointed I did not get a chance to work in the state capital this summer. Working in the building was one of the main highlights of the job being as that I could have met so much people and began to network. The days that I did go (over winter break for training) I started to get a sense of what its like and everyone was so nice. I was looking forward to working with and getting to know these people. Not to mention the random masses of protestors coming in and out before and after session. Now it feels no different than when we were doing classes online. I was more okay with that change but I find it hard being home and having to do work. However, on the other hand, I still feel as though we are doing good work, which is fine with me. I go through hundreds of emails a week trying to help constituents with their problems and at least that feels good. I just don’t feel as though I’m getting the experience I signed up for.
I believe this isn’t that different from university life. Im expected to turn in some said amount of work by a certain time. The only differences are the obvious ones: Im working for my boss not my professor, the work I’m doing is to help others and not myself.
One good skill I’m gaining or honing in on out of this is responsibility. Honestly, the only other professional setting I have worked in besides maybe campus is my job at CVS. Obviously my responsibilities at CVS are dramatically different than working at the governors office, so I feel as though I have gained a whole new aspect of responsibility. Im no longer the kid who sits at the register all day but now I am one of the workers in the office and I share nearly equal responsibility with everyone, with the exception of my supervisor of course. However, we ALL sort emails and etc., he is just better trained so a lot of my decisions have to go through him. Another skill I have learned is another form of code switching. In my neighborhood we use a lot of slang and it does tend to carry over places, however, there is no room for it here. The language required to address constituents has to be very specific given that we are representing the governor himself, which can be difficult some times because as I mentioned before, I have to run everything by my supervisor first. However, he has mentioned to me before that my email drafts are getting better and that I should be able to work on my own at some point.
http://www.ctcapitolreport.com
The hyper link above is the website we use to stay updated about events going on around the state, as it is our job to know these things if a constituent was to come asking.