cmontecalvo's Blog - My Internship with C'mon

Shadowing Danielle Broderick for the past week has been such an amazing experience. I learned so many different business techniques as well as what a director of external affairs actually does behind the scenes of an organization like C’mon. I had no idea how much work was behind making this museum thrive because I only thought that they just built the building and people would come. Of course, I was completely wrong.

On Day 1 of my week-long internship, I was going into the week having no idea what I was going to be doing for the next 5 days. It was a new experience, and I was ready to learn whatever they threw at me. My first job I could relate to, because it was uploading pictures on to their website. I could upload pictures. Done. Then came the research. When Danielle explained what I was doing, I am not afraid to say I had absolutely no idea what she was talking about. I was making a media list. This list consisted of as many magazines that I could think of that had to do with museums, parents, and children that Danielle could refer to for publicity and advertisements. I tried my best, but that part of the job I’m definitely going to need a lot of practice on.

There are so many marketing techniques and efforts involved that I didn’t even know mattered. For example, getting to know your audience seemed like a common theme in the week’s lessons. I learned this mostly during Day 2 of my internship when I went to a meeting about how to get the community more interested in the organization, especially by going to the website. Before this meeting, I thought that everything was really straight forward. Know your audience, and advertise accordingly. Little did I know that there were so many different aspects of “knowing your audience” that I didn’t even think of. For example, by narrowing down the targeted audience, the feedback will be a lot more consistent. Fun ideas like a paver campaign were thought up and discussed during this meeting as well to raise money in not just the generic, donate now, way. All in all, there must be a sense of trust when building up an organization, a trust that the community will get something out of their experience at the museum.

Day 3 mostly consisted of going to Presstige Printing and getting a tour of the building. I learned that printing in mass calls for a lot of machines and computers, but the outcome is definitely worth it in the end. I never knew how much work was put into printing for a large company or organization. The printers were massive, with four, sometimes five sections filled with different color inks. The multiple computers upstairs were controlling what the outcome print would look like in the end. Danielle and I went ultimately to check a newsletter that was being printed, and it turned out to be perfect.

On Day 4, I mostly dealt with the education department that deals directly with the children. In the morning, I helped Hallie Jones with prepping some kids crafts. The first thing I did was build a paper rocket, step-by-step, while Hallie took pictures for the kids to get visuals while making their own rockets. Also, I helped her by punching holes into straws for kids to make pinwheels. Lastly, I helped her with another prepping project to stick Velcro on the insides of dolls so that the kids could stuff objects inside without them falling out. I realized that an education director, like Hallie, must be so busy because prepping projects is only a small portion of her job, and these things take time. I was happy to help her with the time-consuming things so that she could get more work done. During the afternoon, I helped with the preservation of artifacts side of the museum. I took a whole bunch of photos from the woman who donated all of her belongings to the children’s museum when she passed away, and I sorted through which ones were going to be used. This was so interesting because I felt like I was getting a peek inside her very interesting life. After I sorted through the pictures, I researched archive libraries to find places that might be interested in the photos that the museum wasn’t going to use. I learned the process through which artifacts enter a museum, and how the value of an artifact increases when you know more about it.

Day 5 was my last day helping out Danielle and her team, and I spent my time at the public library to help out Hallie Jones again with some hands-on work with the children. The theme of the day was weather, so we read the kids a story about weather, taught them the word “rain” in sign language, let them play with instruments to imitate the sounds of a thunderstorm, as well as created a craft where they used watercolor and crayon draw a thunderstorm. I learned that being active with the kids in the community is extremely important in the creation of a kids’ museum. Even though the museum isn’t open yet, people like Hallie are trying to get the community involved and excited for the museum to open by making these little workshops for the children and their parents.

Overall my experience working with Danielle and her team has been amazing. I learned so much and I cannot wait until that museum is open!