4. Dear Erin,

I am writing this thank you letter as a way to hopefully provide to you an insight on how much I appreciated having you as a mentor and also how much I enjoyed and am thankful for being allowed the experience of interning at MeadsDurket marketing firm. From my experience as an intern (especially at such a young age), I will be taking away many impportant and useful knowlege that not many other High school students have the oportunity of gaining. Some of the skills and knowlege I have gained from my time at MeadsDurket have been, time management skills, some basic marketing lingo, organization skills, and of cource an all-around feel for what working in the field of marketing is like.
Before I came and interned at Meads Durket I had some time management skills, but I was concerned that as soon as I would be out on my own at my intership I would not have anyone reminding me to keep track of anything and I would slowly get behind on all of my work. Luckily when I was acctually put into the situation of being on my own, I was able to create my own system of keeping track of all of my tasks. This then gave me the confidence that I needed for the next time and all of the instances after where I will be on my own and will need to stay organized.
From my time interning at Meads Durket marketing firm, I of cource learned some new and often used marketing "lingo" that I might possibly use in my future if I so choose to persue a career in Marketing. Some of the "lingo" that I now have in my vocabulary that I didn't have before are the terms media buys, media plans, media statuses, media traffic, and insertions. These key terms all refer to different graphs which are used in order to organize all of the information about a certain account. Although they are all simply graphs they each have specific topics that they are dealing with. Media plans deal with TV, radio, and print slots and during which times of the year they show, Media buys are more of a detailed graph of the media plans graphs detailing specific times and days that specific adds air, Media statuses (which can also be called print statuses) are a graph that is different still from all the rest, and Media traffic which is pretty much an outline of the communications with stations.
Just like my newly developed time management skills, before my internship, I did have some organizational skills I had just not really felt the pressure to apply them yet. Once I was thrown into an acctual real world evironment though, I surprised myself by being able to, and even preffering to be neat and organized. I was able to develop a routine that I was able to carry out each day and the result was that my desk never became messy, but at the same time I had everything that I needed and knew where everything was at my desk.
I am so glad tthat I got paired with you as my mentor. You have been a perfect match for me not only because of all of our comonalities, but also because of your kind helppful personality. You were also always so open to helping me whenever I needed help with something and always open to answering any of my questions which allowed me to gain as much information as possible from this experience.
My experience here at MeadsDurket was very enlightening for me as well as useful because of all of the skills that I gained as well as the confidence that I gained from realizing that I can be independant and have a happy successfull life as well and so thank you for providing me with guidence all along the way.

Thank you again, Malia

2. "Your major that you choose has absolutely NO bearing on what your career will be." This piece of advice was important for me and stood out because it gave me comfort that the major that I first choose will most likely not be the career I will go into and that from there on I will be locked into that field for the rest of my life.
"I was dead-set on becoming a sports news reporter, but then one thing lead to another and now here I am with a career in advertising and marketing and probably just as happy if not more happy with where I am at today in my career." This quote is important to me for the same reasons that the first quote is important to me, but it also gives me a new perspective going into college and the rest of my life that it is important to keep an open mind when it comes to my career choice.
"My job gives me enjoyment out of it so I don't ever feel like I am even working when I am getting work done at home." This statement from my mentor is now my goal for my life and career. It just sounds like such a nice situation and I would like to either apply it to my life starting and continuing on from right away or to simply work towards this situation in hopes that I could achieve it at one point in my life.

6. So far I am thankful for a lot of things that I have gained from this internship experience. I am most thankful for the Independence I have developed as a result of my internship. Throughout this internship I have had to keep track of everything that I have had to get done and hold myself to actually getting it all done and I have also had to time manage my own time in order to complete everything I have needed to complete on time. I have also had to hold myself to waking up on time and getting ready to go and leaving my house at the right time so that I show up to work on time. In a more abstract way of looking at my internship experience, it has also allowed me to become more familiar with getting around and know where things are in San Diego because of all the driving I have had to do on my own to many different places.This internship has been and will hopefully continue to be one constant learning experience for me.

4. The reason I pursued the internship I now have at a marketing firm was because Marketing was a profession that I was seriously considering going into. My mentor is the Account Supervisor at MeadsDurket and while part of her job I would enjoy, not love but, I would enjoy, but then the fact that her job as well as everyone else around hers jobs are "desks jobs" where they sit at a desk and work all day is highly displeasing. My internship also required that I function in a "desk job" and that is where I base my newly-found hate for desk jobs. I am now glad that I had this internship because I have decided that I would not lead a very happy life if I had a desk job. Since the majority of the employees that work at MeadsDurket I have also some-what eliminated marketing as potential employment for when I am older.



5. I have always had a hard time remembering and keeping track of minor details and assignments that I have to complete which caused me to be a bit concerned about starting my internship. However, once I got here, I have surprised myself on how I have been able to stay on top of all my work that has to be accomplished and I have made all of my deadlines. I have been able to use many different tactics such as using sticky notes, clipping important information papers up around my desk, using my planner, and continuously keeping my desk/area completely clean and organized. So far, this experience as a whole has given me a large amount of confidence about how I will be able to continue to lead my life in the real world after high school.

The First Week of Internship

1. Starting in on my internship at MeadsDurket Marketing Firm I am most excited about the end result when I will be able to see an ad on a billboard or in a magazine and will be able to say, "I helped make that" and it will be something that many many people will be seeing around in their everyday lives.

The only thing that I may be as little bit nervous about would be not messing something up when it comes to the process of creating an entire ad campaign. If I were to mess even the smallest detail up in an ad campaign it would obviously highlight the fact that I am inexperienced which would be an embarrassing fact to have attached to my name.

Finally, I am wondering about if there is a specific lunch time or not at my internship because I don't want to assume so and then starve because it never comes, but I also don't want to go ahead and start eating my lunch when I am not supposed to be eating it. This is a very minor question that I have, but I am glad that is the only thing that I am wondering about or am unsure of.

6. The environment at my internship is very relaxed. People are walking around to each others desks and periodically chatting about things such as; how their weekend was, what they are doing after work, people are making coffee runs at random times throughout the day, and talking on the phone to their friends and family members while they are completing the work that they are required to complete. At the same time that all of this is going on there is also a sort of hidden organization and system that ensures all work is completed on time and to the companies best ability which must be why this marketing firm is successful at what it does.