Who Am I Now
As High Tech High students there are so many different experiences that are unique to the school and having an internship is one of them. High Tech promotes readiness for the “real world” and so as a junior, I was put into the real world for a month. While I thought that I was ready for it, I could never really have expected all that I would benefit from it. Before internship I was lacking motivation on my school assignments and it was beginning to show in my personal life and school life. This once great student that I was, was gone. While I was excited for the change in routine, I was scared I wasn’t going to find motivation at my internship site. The third day of internship was a day I will always remember just three days in and I had found my motivation again, and all while I wasn’t looking for it. I got the chance to be part of a change in my community. There was an organization of gleaners: gleaners go to places that have crops and they harvest the leftover ones, and this organization picked about 500 pounds of oranges and donated all of them. They donated them to a local food pantry located at a school. Students who were facing food insecurity could take food from the pantry. While I have never once faced food insecurity, I have never thought about all of the people who do , and not just all around the world but in the U.S.. The students were so excited about the oranges, that it made me happy with the work that I had helped with that day. I realized all of the things that people struggle with, and here I was without any motivation. So I made a deal with myself to make a difference. All of my work during internship was around food waste and food insecurity, but more importantly it was about making a change in the way that the community dealt with these problems. I had once again found my motivation. All of those students were looking forwards to something as simple as oranges, and it brought happiness to their day. I learned now that I always have to be looking for those little moments, like the oranges to motivate me.