My name is Jordan Warren, and I am a Business Major with a Computer Science Minor at the University of Southern Maine. I am very interested in Usability, Website Design, and Information Systems Management. I am the very first intern taken on by Portland Web design studio Pemaquid Communications.
As I started looking for internships, I was finding that most of those available are either all on the business side of things or too technical for my current set of skills.
Then Pemaquid’s principal, Rob Landry, came to speak at my e-commerce class, and everything he had to say about his own company was what I was interested in, and he seemed fun and enthusiastic about his career, so I did the brave thing and asked if he would like to have an intern, and we found a way to make it work.
Having never entered into an internship, I had only my own assumptions and friends’ stories to go on as to what it would be like. Having an employer who has never had an intern has added an interesting twist on things as far as I can tell.
Rob has gone out of his way to make sure I feel welcome at the office and has gone above and beyond to make sure I start out with the right tools and knowledge so we can both benefit from this partnership. Sheila Reiser, the Creative Services Coordinator, has been just as helpful, and is as excited to learn as I am.
Pemaquid is a unique environment and because of that I think I will gain more from this experience than I would have from a company that “knows what they’re doing†when it comes to interns. I told the folks at Pemaquid that I wouldn’t mind fetching coffee for them, but I don’t think I’ll be doing much of that.
The experience is much more like school than I expected, so far, but in a good way. Rob is so eager to share his knowledge and we have discussed the things I am most interested in learning. From there, he has offered books for me to read, and websites to look over, we are even starting a delicious account for Pemaquid that will include all our favorite sites for other to use to help them find what they are looking for.
It is also a lot more technical than I thought I would be able to find for an internship. I expected to end up in an office somewhere, filing, but instead I get to learn more about HTML and CSS and eventually help on some projects at Pemaquid.
I am so lucky to have landed this opportunity to learn and make connections throughout the Portland area in the process. I don’t think there is any way I can learn all that the people at Pemaquid could teach me in a single summer but it will definitely be a most worthwhile experience.
