What is LINK?
LINK (Leading Internships for New Knowledge) is a part of the curriculum at Animas High School that allows juniors to set up a 3 week internship in a field of interest. Students have the option to travel as far as they want for their internship, some go as far as Africa and Asia. LINK gives students the opportunity to experience life in the workforce and helps to shape their ideas for the future.
Business Description
Berg Performance is an Audi, Volkswagen, and Porsche specialty shop. They service, repair, and modify customers’ vehicles. The business is very focused on delivering very high-quality work and excellent customer service. Interning here showed me that I do want to be able to work on cars, but as a hobby, not a profession.
LINK (Leading Internships for New Knowledge) is a part of the curriculum at Animas High School that allows juniors to set up a 3 week internship in a field of interest. Students have the option to travel as far as they want for their internship, some go as far as Africa and Asia. LINK gives students the opportunity to experience life in the workforce and helps to shape their ideas for the future.
Business Description
Berg Performance is an Audi, Volkswagen, and Porsche specialty shop. They service, repair, and modify customers’ vehicles. The business is very focused on delivering very high-quality work and excellent customer service. Interning here showed me that I do want to be able to work on cars, but as a hobby, not a profession.
yRoad to the Internship
For the past several years I have had a passion for cars. Love the creativity, engineering, math, and hands-on work that goes into building a fast car. Because of that, I focused my search on the automotive industry, mostly shops that modified vehicles to improve performance. I wanted to see what it was like to be a technician in one of these shops and learn more about how to modify, repair, and maintain cars. I also wanted to help the businesses in whatever way I could by utilizing my strong work ethic, critical thinking skills, and positive attitude.
I began my search in November 2017 by asking family and friends if they knew anyone who worked in the fields I am interested in. Next, I took to the internet to track down interesting businesses in cities where I would likely have a place to stay during the internship. I reached out to sixteen businesses and individuals, many didn’t respond and even more said no. After tons of emails, phone calls, and letters, I had nailed down an internship. A week or so later my mentor called and informed me that my position had been filled by a friend of mine and I no longer had the internship. The search began again and with a bit more work I managed to line up another one. Unfortunately, three weeks before I was set to start, that one fell through too. Luckily I found another one, this time in Portland. It was far away but looked like a good opportunity. However, my bad luck continued when four days before I was going to leave, I got an email from my mentor saying he would not be able to accommodate me after all. With hardly any time left and no plan D, I was scrambling to find a new internship. I contacted the first place that had initially accepted me and begged them to let us both intern there. Understanding my position, the owner, Aaron gave me the internship. That last week before the internship was incredibly stressful.
LINK Project
For the project portion of this internship, I designed and built an elevated platform that allows the techs to access the interior of the car while it was raised on the alignment rack. The most challenging part of the design was the stipulation that the platform had to fold flat against the wall when it was not being used. The platform was made entirely of metal which gave me a great opportunity to practice welding. I have done a tiny bit of welding before, but not enough to be any good. Throughout the project, my welding got far better. Welding was the skill I developed the most during LINK. I was very happy with the end product; it functioned very well and was easy to use.
For the past several years I have had a passion for cars. Love the creativity, engineering, math, and hands-on work that goes into building a fast car. Because of that, I focused my search on the automotive industry, mostly shops that modified vehicles to improve performance. I wanted to see what it was like to be a technician in one of these shops and learn more about how to modify, repair, and maintain cars. I also wanted to help the businesses in whatever way I could by utilizing my strong work ethic, critical thinking skills, and positive attitude.
I began my search in November 2017 by asking family and friends if they knew anyone who worked in the fields I am interested in. Next, I took to the internet to track down interesting businesses in cities where I would likely have a place to stay during the internship. I reached out to sixteen businesses and individuals, many didn’t respond and even more said no. After tons of emails, phone calls, and letters, I had nailed down an internship. A week or so later my mentor called and informed me that my position had been filled by a friend of mine and I no longer had the internship. The search began again and with a bit more work I managed to line up another one. Unfortunately, three weeks before I was set to start, that one fell through too. Luckily I found another one, this time in Portland. It was far away but looked like a good opportunity. However, my bad luck continued when four days before I was going to leave, I got an email from my mentor saying he would not be able to accommodate me after all. With hardly any time left and no plan D, I was scrambling to find a new internship. I contacted the first place that had initially accepted me and begged them to let us both intern there. Understanding my position, the owner, Aaron gave me the internship. That last week before the internship was incredibly stressful.
LINK Project
For the project portion of this internship, I designed and built an elevated platform that allows the techs to access the interior of the car while it was raised on the alignment rack. The most challenging part of the design was the stipulation that the platform had to fold flat against the wall when it was not being used. The platform was made entirely of metal which gave me a great opportunity to practice welding. I have done a tiny bit of welding before, but not enough to be any good. Throughout the project, my welding got far better. Welding was the skill I developed the most during LINK. I was very happy with the end product; it functioned very well and was easy to use.
Reflection
Prepossessed Skill
The most valuable skill I had coming into my internship was my ability to assess a situation and determine where I could contribute without having to be micromanaged by my mentor. Most of the time he was busy working on customer cars or managing the business so it was important for me to not be constantly interrupting him to ask what to do.
Biggest Challenge
My biggest challenge during link (excluding securing one in the first place) was actually unrelated to the internship itself. Before the internship, Lance, the other student interning there, and I had arranged to carpool to and from work each day. Because of this, I did not bring a car with me to Denver. Unfortunately, Sunday night before the last week of the internship Lance’s father, Joel, made an executive decision to not allow Lance to drive me anymore. This was a big problem because I was staying about a 30-minute drive from Berg. I didn’t see any reason for this decision - Lance was happy to drive me and I was helping pay for the gas - so I called Joel to ask why he had made this decision. He did not answer so left a message that explained how this decision had thrown a huge wrench in my plans. I didn’t even know how I was going to get to work the next morning and that I saw no reason to cause me so much trouble.
He completely ignored my attempts to resolve the situation respectfully. The only response I got was a text that said he was firm in his decision Lance could not drive me to work. I asked one more time for a reason as to why he was causing me so much stress and inconvenience. He told me if I contacted him again he would consider it harassment.
Dealing with this situation showed me that even though I’m often dealing with people older than me, I sometimes have to be the adult. I handled the situation as considerately and maturely as I could, but there is only so much I could accomplish with someone who is unwilling to openly communicate. This sort of interaction will inevitably happen again and I will be less shocked when it does. There are just some people that are impossible to work with and now I know a little more about how to deal with them.
Luckily our car had broken down in a town called Fairplay a couple of hours south of Denver and had just been repaired and the people I was staying with were very accommodating and left work early to help me get to the bus station so I could go pick up the car.
My Importance to the Business
Going into this internship I didn't have even close to the amount of knowledge or experience to be valuable as a technician, what I do provide is high-quality work at no cost to the business. Interns can do work that would not be worth the technicians’ time. For example, I spent a few hours digging through forums to find a specific fault code that had popped up on a car they were working on. The stared platform is another example of something they hadn't had the time to get to.
Prepossessed Skill
The most valuable skill I had coming into my internship was my ability to assess a situation and determine where I could contribute without having to be micromanaged by my mentor. Most of the time he was busy working on customer cars or managing the business so it was important for me to not be constantly interrupting him to ask what to do.
Biggest Challenge
My biggest challenge during link (excluding securing one in the first place) was actually unrelated to the internship itself. Before the internship, Lance, the other student interning there, and I had arranged to carpool to and from work each day. Because of this, I did not bring a car with me to Denver. Unfortunately, Sunday night before the last week of the internship Lance’s father, Joel, made an executive decision to not allow Lance to drive me anymore. This was a big problem because I was staying about a 30-minute drive from Berg. I didn’t see any reason for this decision - Lance was happy to drive me and I was helping pay for the gas - so I called Joel to ask why he had made this decision. He did not answer so left a message that explained how this decision had thrown a huge wrench in my plans. I didn’t even know how I was going to get to work the next morning and that I saw no reason to cause me so much trouble.
He completely ignored my attempts to resolve the situation respectfully. The only response I got was a text that said he was firm in his decision Lance could not drive me to work. I asked one more time for a reason as to why he was causing me so much stress and inconvenience. He told me if I contacted him again he would consider it harassment.
Dealing with this situation showed me that even though I’m often dealing with people older than me, I sometimes have to be the adult. I handled the situation as considerately and maturely as I could, but there is only so much I could accomplish with someone who is unwilling to openly communicate. This sort of interaction will inevitably happen again and I will be less shocked when it does. There are just some people that are impossible to work with and now I know a little more about how to deal with them.
Luckily our car had broken down in a town called Fairplay a couple of hours south of Denver and had just been repaired and the people I was staying with were very accommodating and left work early to help me get to the bus station so I could go pick up the car.
My Importance to the Business
Going into this internship I didn't have even close to the amount of knowledge or experience to be valuable as a technician, what I do provide is high-quality work at no cost to the business. Interns can do work that would not be worth the technicians’ time. For example, I spent a few hours digging through forums to find a specific fault code that had popped up on a car they were working on. The stared platform is another example of something they hadn't had the time to get to.