Internship Leads to Career Exploration

By Brenda Garcia

Excitement, happiness, and accomplishment are all things I felt when I found out I was interning at Kaiser Permanente’s Baldwin Park Medical Center. I worked very hard on my application because I knew it would be difficult to get accepted – this was the first class of interns from my school, and there were only four openings for this internship. I put a lot of pressure on myself to earn this amazing once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

The day finally came –the results were in. I remember anxiously waiting for my name to be called out and finally – there it was! I was one out the four students that had been accepted. I was assigned to the Operation Room (OR). I spent a lot of time working closely with Viviana Serrano, a business project manager at the medical center. I would help her take inventory of crash carts, restock necessary tools, and make sure all the orders for equipment and other materials had been sent. I was constantly amazed at all the things that went on behind-the-scenes that most patients take for granted. If it wasn’t for people like Viviana, the hospital wouldn’t function properly.

I know I am extremely lucky to have gotten a chance to intern at Kaiser Permanente, but the internship experience in general is something almost all my peers at school get to take part in as part of our Linked Learning experience. Together, my classes and internship work give me experiences and knowledge that most high school students only dream of.

I am also very lucky to have maintained close relationships with all my co-workers, which means I am already building a network of peers and supervisors who can recommend me for future jobs. My internship with Kaiser Permanente was one of the best experiences I have ever had. If you ever have a chance for an internship, take it, you never know what might happen or what you’ll learn.