Meet the Interns: Council, Legal, EMA & Human Resources
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 HUNTSVILLE, AL (July 15, 2010)-- This article is the next in the "Meet the Interns" series about the young men and women who have applied and been chosen for a summer internship with the City of Huntsville.
The interns have volunteered many hours in many departments in order to gain experience helpful for their future careers and to give back to the Huntsville community.
This week's article features five young men and women in four different departments: Rashida Lorde in City Council, Ruth Woodard in Legal Services, Kathryn Moore and James Hutson with the Emergency Management Agency, and Samantha Nelson in Human Resources.
Rashida Lorde applied for the program in order to "gain firsthand experience of how policy is formulated and implemented." Since she is interested in these policy decisions, she said, "I chose the City Council because being the legislative branch of government it would be the best environment to expand my knowledge about the policy making process." She said two of the most memorable experiences of the program were shadowing Councilman Culver and sitting at the head table during a Council meeting with the mayor and councilmen and women.
In praise of the internship program, she said, "Having engaged in a variety of internships previously, I can honestly say the internship with the City of Huntsville is a cut above the rest!" She will graduate in the spring with a Master's Degree in Social Work (MSW) in Policy, Planning and Administration and Mental Health from Alabama A&M University. She is currently applying for PhD programs in Public Administration.
Ruth Woodard will be a sophomore at the University of Virginia majoring in foreign affairs with a minor in microeconomics. She applied for this internship as a "stepping stone to other internships" in the future. She chose the legal department because she took pre-law courses in college and loves the logic of the subject. She hopes to either attend law school or attain a Master's Degree in public policy, and eventually work for the federal government.
During the internship, she has been doing legal research and finding case law for the department. She has also been visiting the municipal court and doing paralegal work, such as developing case files. She said she has really enjoyed her work, and that it has helped "apply the theoretic level of learning to real situations."
Kathryn Moore just completed her freshman year at Union University in Tennessee and plans on majoring in Public Relations. Although her chosen department and major may not seem compatible at first glance, she said she "chose EMA because they deal with crises and emergencies on a daily basis and learning how to handle these incidents will prepare me for crises and emergencies I may encounter when I am in the public relations field." She also said that one of the most important lessons she has learned from the internship is "how important teamwork is and how necessary good communication is to completing a goal." She hopes to participate in three or four different internships before she graduates to explore the possible careers of a public relations major.
James Hutson will graduate from Jacksonville State this winter with a major in Emergency Management and a minor in Homeland Security. He said, "I applied for the internship with the Emergency Management Agency to broaden my practical knowledge of the field, as opposed to the text book information I have been receiving for the past three years." After graduation he hopes to work for the Huntsville Fire Department, and he believes that the connections he has made with "the 'big wigs' in the fire service" will help him accomplish this goal.
He and Moore's personalities complement each other well. Moore is very outgoing while Hutson is laid back, and as Moore said, "We really balance each other out, so it's great working together!" During this internship they have worked on projects such as an awareness campaign for local stores in preparation for September's National Disaster Preparedness Month, a small business continuity plan for the City of Madison, and met with major news stations in order to discuss how the EMA and the media can work together in the face of an emergency.
Samantha Nelson is an upcoming junior at Auburn University majoring in Political Science and Journalism. She said, "My goal was to have a fair amount of internships during my undergraduate studies…I was on the look-out for a good, solid first internship," such as this internship with the City of Huntsville. She has been involved in many activities with Human Resources, such as working at the city clinic, helping at lectures and classes sponsored by the city, conducting a new employee orientation, and learning about benefits provided to different employees.
Eventually, she hopes to gain a doctorate in Public Administration and Public Policy and become a professor of political theory, as well as become a political analyst for a major broadcasting network. She said this internship will be extremely beneficial by giving her hands-on experience.
Thank you to these young men and women for their service to the City of Huntsville and the Huntsville community as a whole.
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Alan Reeves & Stephanie Volz, Interns with the Office of the Mayor, wrote this article.
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Follow the City of Huntsville on Facebook at facebook.com/hsvcity and on Twitter at twitter.com/huntsvillecity
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