Meghan May

Agency: Divorce Recovery (Our Family Services)

Term: Fall - 2004

This semester I began an internship at Divorce Recovery, a program affiliated with the Family Counseling Agency. The program runs a number of volunteer-led support groups for individuals in families that are experiencing divorce or remarriage. Divorce Recovery also offers classes that teach topics such as effective parenting strategies, financial planning, and various topics on intimate relationships. I chose this internship site because it was most directly related to my future career goals of becoming a marriage and family therapist.

Interning at Divorce Recovery has been a great experience so far. I work in the office for six to eight hours a week helping with mailings, making copies, answering phones, typing documents, or helping with whatever else needs to be done that day. I also spent the first seven or so weeks of the internship attending training classes on Monday nights. Now that the training has ended, I have begun to work with the Children of Divorce group every week as a leader.

The group started last week, and it was great to finally be able to put my training to use. I was a bit nervous about starting the group, but everything went well. Having four other group leaders there made it easier, especially since some of them had led a Children of Divorce group before. The kids were all nervous about being there as well, but the group leaders and I worked together to facilitate discussions and activities that made them feel more at ease. I am enjoying my experience with this group, and I am looking forward to getting to know the children better over the next seven weeks.

Interning at Divorce Recovery has helped me to gain a much deeper understanding of the process of divorce and how people learn to get through it. This has been thanks to the incredible people that volunteer and work at Divorce Recovery. They are a wealth of knowledge and life experiences, and have been willing to share what they know with those of us who want to learn. I have learned a lot from everyone involved, and I am looking forward to spending another semester and a half with all of them.

I would recommend Divorce Recovery to any student that was considering an internship. I have not been at all disappointed by my experience there. Divorce Recovery depends on volunteers and students to keep the program going. For this reason, students always feel valued and needed, no matter what task they might be working on. Additionally, it is great to finally be able to apply all the theories and hypothetical situations that we learn in Family Studies courses to real people. Getting to work with community members makes a student realize that they are actually getting something truly useful out of their education.

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