Internships offer more than just filler in the vast, bare expanses in the desert of blank pages of your first CV. They offer practical experience, a chance to apply your theoretical knowledge, and valuable life lessons.

Being a small intern at a big company makes you feel exactly that – small. If I had to describe it using the classic comparison of being tossed into the deep end of a swimming pool, it would not suffice – not even with the addition of cement boots. Being an intern in your first year is more like being tossed from a ten meter-diving board into the deep end of a swimming pool without any water in it. And then being eaten alive by sharks with claws.

As a first year Journalism and Media Studies (JMS) student at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, I was required to perform a “Shadow Week”, or the equivalent of 40 working hours, at any media institution. This requirement had to be fulfilled, whether I felt I was prepared or not – I would not be admitted to second year Journalism without it.

So, I asked my mother – who is ferociously good and equally scary when it comes to networking – to start asking around for a cool, dark place I could spend a week in and emerge with a piece of paper singing my praises.

I was never going to get it that easy.

In April, I started my first internship at Sapa (the South African Press Association). Sapa is a fast-paced, mostly anonymous, and completely ruthless news machine. It retrieves information in any way possible, processes this information in record time, and spits stories out faster than you imagined news could even happen. I felt faint.

After a whirlwind of press conferences, crime stories, and accident reports – I was done. I had a few online stories under my name (well, not really, because Sapa owns the stories), and I had a world of experience under my belt. There, I found out how online news works, how to extract information from less-than-willing sources, and how to write a good crime story in under 10 minutes.

More than anything, however, I learned that I did not ever want to work in Sapa or any company resembling it. The constant churning of mediocre news stories is not quite up my aisle.

For my second internship (because I wanted to make absolutely sure of my future in the field of journalism) I was afforded the incredible opportunity of working with a company called Modern Times, who are responsible for the production of the South African investigative journalism television show called Carte Blanche. Here, I learned how videos are edited and put together into the product that is shown on our TV screens in the end. I learned a lot behind the technology that goes into producing a high-quality show like Carte Blanche, and I even got to help out, a little.

Internships are incredibly useful tools in the economy of today. It is nigh impossible to get the job of your dreams as a first choice – how do you get the job experience every job seems to demand of you? It is a conundrum that can easily be solved by the nifty little internship. It provides you with experience impossible to teach in a lecture theatre, and prepares you for the ‘real world’ in which you will be a part of an intricate production or creation process. One day in a newsroom will provide you with insight you will not get in ten years of lectures and tutorials.

In the modern labour force, knowledge paired with practical experience serves as the most powerful tool in securing your future and making the best out of your education.

About the author: Kayla is currently a first-year Journalism and Media Studies student at Rhodes University in Grahamstown, South Africa. She writes for student newspaper Activate under the Politics, Business, and Opinions sections, and she is also a sub-editor. Her other subjects are Economics, English, History and Sociology. She devours books. She is also one of the blessed few who enjoy working. She is involved with SHARC (Student HIV/AIDS Resistance Campaign) at Rhodes and is busy with a course in Peer Education. She loves watching art films and her guilty pleasure is shopping.

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