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Avoiding the Summer Internship Craze

by Hannah Miller

For Ashley Beck, interning and CollegePlus! have been a perfect match.

Everyone knows that internships are key to gaining practical experience before entering the working world. Yet anyone applying for the typical summer internship knows the stiff competition that potential interns are up against. Not so, however, for students pursuing their degree through accelerated distance learning (ADL).

The flexibility of ADL enables students to expand their college experience at any time during the year instead of just during the summer months. Ashley Beck, a CollegePlus! student from Idaho took advantage of this flexibility when she combined an internship with her CollegePlus! studies to gain practical life experience during her college years.

Combining Internship with CollegePlus!

When Beck was 18, her mom introduced her to ADL. However, she says, “I did not think I was self-disciplined enough.” When the Becks found out about CollegePlus!, it was “perfect—distance [learning] plus coaching” she said.

Around the same time, Beck and her parents attended a seminar geared toward people interested in event and conference planning. Incidentally, event planning was something that piqued Beck’s interest and after talking with the seminar hosts, they agreed to allow her to intern with them.

When Beck started the internship in August of 2006, she didn’t think she would have time to do both CollegePlus! and an internship. “I started going to hotel meetings. traveling to and from seminars, managing and running them with” her supervisor, she said. Atlanta, Phoenix, Las Vegas and Singapore were business destinations for Beck. Nonetheless, the flexibility of her job and ADL allowed her to simultaneously pursue a marketing degree with CollegePlus! while working for the event company. In fact, Beck began her accelerated degree studies four months into her internship and now expects to graduate later this spring with a BSBA in General Management.

A Growing Experience

Beck has used tools she learned through the internship toward obtaining her degree and visa versa. “The biggest one was self-discipline,” she said. Beck learned to maximize her efficiency by carving out enough time for study and work. Her internship and degree process also strengthened her diligence. Another essential quality she learned was “to initiate and not wait for others to get [the job] done,” she said. Having to meet with her CollegePlus! coach as well as to report to her supervisor also developed accountability. As she gleaned valuable insight from them, Beck applied the principles her supervisor taught her, building a relationship of trust with her employer.

For the Future

Both of Beck’s parents are entrepreneurs, owning two home-based businesses. She takes care of the secretarial work and bookkeeping for them—another unique experience. Beck said that she has picked up a lot of practical business skills from them. Even before her graduation, Beck has applied the skills learned from her internship, her parents’ companies and her degree to launch her own home-based business in seminar marketing and outsourcing. You can check out her websites at www.theoutsourceagent.com, www.seminaragent.com, and www.ashleybecklive.com. For those looking into internships, she noted that they are “not a waste of time. [You] get to try something new. If it works, great! Even if you don’t like the job you have a good experience.”

Hannah Miller is a CollegePlus! student from Orlando, FL and plans to graduate with a BA in Communications in the spring of 2008. Besides spending time with her family and studying for classes, Hannah enjoys updating her blog, reading classic literature, cooking and, of course, writing for Acceleration!

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