San Juan Basin Public Health
I interned at San Juan Basin Public Health with Kate Jones, the Thriving Youth Supervisor. I was specifically working with the Youth Involvement Work Group, a group of people from across the county hoping to include more youth voice in this community and its organizations.
My project has a couple different aspects, throughout the semester, I have been promoting the Youth Involvement Work Group to youth across the county. I have gone to most of the schools in the area and discussed the issues that students see that effect them. The purpose of this group is to bring youth to the table on issues that effect them, like suicide prevention and mental health care. The second aspect of my project is a presentation at the Shared Risk and Protective Factors Conference. I will be presenting about cultural awareness and youth voice.
I learned a lot through this internship, especially around the Youth Involvement Work Group. Through helping get this group off the ground I learned how important outreach to a wide range of community members is. I also learned about the struggles that come along with creating a group of any sort, many different people felt like they had ownership of this group, and that caused some disagreement. I feel this experience will help me in the future because when I start to form possibly similar groups in college or after, I will already have sense of what I need to prepare for. The main area of growth I discovered was making sure that I don't commit to things I don't have time for. I tend to say I can do a task, and then realize that I don't have time to do it. I need to start thinking about my existing commitments before I commit to anything else. Overall, this internship showed me an aspect of community work that I was unfamiliar with, and this knowledge will definitely help me when I start to figure out what I want to do as a career.
My project has a couple different aspects, throughout the semester, I have been promoting the Youth Involvement Work Group to youth across the county. I have gone to most of the schools in the area and discussed the issues that students see that effect them. The purpose of this group is to bring youth to the table on issues that effect them, like suicide prevention and mental health care. The second aspect of my project is a presentation at the Shared Risk and Protective Factors Conference. I will be presenting about cultural awareness and youth voice.
I learned a lot through this internship, especially around the Youth Involvement Work Group. Through helping get this group off the ground I learned how important outreach to a wide range of community members is. I also learned about the struggles that come along with creating a group of any sort, many different people felt like they had ownership of this group, and that caused some disagreement. I feel this experience will help me in the future because when I start to form possibly similar groups in college or after, I will already have sense of what I need to prepare for. The main area of growth I discovered was making sure that I don't commit to things I don't have time for. I tend to say I can do a task, and then realize that I don't have time to do it. I need to start thinking about my existing commitments before I commit to anything else. Overall, this internship showed me an aspect of community work that I was unfamiliar with, and this knowledge will definitely help me when I start to figure out what I want to do as a career.