Cassie Villegas

Agency: Our Family Services

Term: Fall - 2003

I am doing my internship for Our Town Family Center. The specific program that I work for is called CommonUnity. It is a program for young mothers between the ages of 18-21 years old. The program is preparing the women for independent living. Each woman lives in their own apartment with their children and is required to work and attend school. They are required to meet with a case manager and attend certain classes on life skills. My responsibilities include office duties such as making new files for the girls, watching the children while the mothers attend classes, interacting with residents, and pretty much anything else that may come up along the way.

I decided to do this internship for many reasons. First, I wanted to get some real life experiences. The things I was and am learning in my classes are all very interesting but to be able to go out and apply it is helping me to understand the concepts better. Second I wanted to feel like I was making a difference somewhere and this has helped me feel that. I also wanted to try out different areas within my field of study to see which had a good fit for my future career.

At this point I am not really sure what my goals for after graduation are. It used to be just getting a job, but I recently got a job in my field so that is taken care of. I think I just want to try out new things until I find where I fit in. Eventually I want to go to graduate school after I figure out my main area of interest.

I have learned a lot of things since starting my internship. I was really scared when I started thinking that I would be working directly with people because there is a lot of pressure thinking that if you mess up then you could potentially cause issues in someone’s life. I have come to realize that although you do have a great potential to be an influence for someone, you can’t save everyone and you will drive yourself crazy trying. The people I have been working with have helped me see that all you can do is your best and sometimes that is not enough, but it is a wonderful feeling. It was a pretty big stress reliever to realize that it is not my job to save the world!

I think the greatest part of this internship has been my interactions with the children on the site. They amaze me constantly. Being able to watch their interactions and development has been very interesting. At first I was terrified at the thought that one of my main responsibilities would be to watch them while the moms were in class because I did not think I was good with children. Almost immediately I was completely comfortable with them and it has come to be one of the best parts of my week. It has also been a great experience because I wasn’t sure if the mothers would be very accepting of me at first but after watching me with their kids a few of them have seemed more willing to interact with me.

The best advice I can give is to make sure you are in a place that you feel comfortable. If you think you want to do one thing and then you start and realize that it is not the right fit for you then don’t be afraid to ask to change your program. You have to be somewhere that you can see yourself staying for an entire year so you may as well be happy. It is what you make it and so far it’s been great!

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