Caroline Wilson

Responsibilities

Responsibilities during my internship were collaborating with team members to organize and execute our Fourth of July event. Within our Fourth of July there were three different bands, free food and drinks, kids activities and games, raffle, and lastly fireworks. My team and I collaborate together months in advance to successfully put this on for 2,000 people. Another responsibility I had was creating Missions week which is a week long event where we serve our community by pairing with 23 organizations and conducting 51 different projects throughout six days. It took a lot of planning with the partnering organizations but also the leaders that communicate with the volunteers and creating availability for each volunteer, leader, and partner organization. While on top of those I also aided in the hospitality on Sunday mornings with church service, volunteers, and preparation of the cafe.

Accomplishments

There are many things that I accomplished this summer that I thought I never could. First thing was that it was the first year bringing a raffle to the Fourth of July event in which I planned and executed very well and I was very pleased with myself although it was small raffle, it was a big success and guest were very happy with the items that they won. Secondly, creating an event from the ground up which was Missions Week, and being able to be flexible with the organizations while also it being a strong, well attended event.

Learning experience

One lesson that I learned was that planning for an event is never done until the event is finished and everything is put away. I learned that during our first Missions Week here at Pathfinder Church. A week before the event I breathed a sigh of relief thinking we had done the best we could just to figure out we had a meeting in 30 minutes about the marketing aspect of the event and how each poster will be strategically placed through the Church and city so that we can reach a bigger audience as to what we were doing that week. There are always new ideas and ways to be more effective during the event therefore the planning never ends until the each person has left and the event has concluded.

What advice would you give?

Advice I would give to students would be to never say no to opportunities that could help you grow within the industry that you are in. In anything that you do there is also room to grow and develop new knowledge you may have never had before.