Finals, Enrollment, and Internships (oh my!)

It’s officially 2016, and I am currently home in Philly on winter break! I spent a lovely two weeks in Florida with my family and am now catching up with friends from home. My third semester at Holy Cross wrapped up nicely- I only had two finals and a paper, along with performing in a small production of Thorton Wilder’s “Our Town” for my acting final. I found studying in Cool Beans 2, the cafe located in Stein Hall, to be a great spot! It stays open late, has comfortable leather couches, plays coffee house music and offers a haven for caffeine lovers (a habit I’ve been trying to curb- no more espresso for me!).

Christmas spirit was alive and well on campus this winter despite the absence of snow. Dorm rooms were decorated with tinsel and trees, cookies were baked, and Elf was watched on repeat. The annual Tree Lighting was a lovely night of carols and the Christmas dinner in Kimball served delicious red velvet cupcakes. Make sure to bring an ugly sweater for the Holy Cross holiday season- it’s the reigning campus fashion trend in December.

Celebrating the holidays with my friend and fellow RA, Jack

After the stress of finals week, I stayed with the other RAs and attended a staff Christmas party before closing down the building. We exchanged gifts and ate a delicious meal in our common room. Below is a picture of our staff Christmas card!

I successfully enrolled in four classes for next semester, a feat which required my friends and I to wake up at 6 AM on enrollment day. We found a spot in a Beaven Hall computer lab with dozens of other sophomores, frantically clicked “enroll” when the time came, let out a sigh of relief, and got an early morning breakfast at Kimball. I’ll be taking Early British Literature, Genetics, Contemporary Italy, and Liberation Theology, four different classes I am really looking forward to. Being such a small school, I am lucky to have friends in each class!

Now for the number one thing on every sophomore’s mind this break: finding a summer internship. Career Services has been a tremendous help to me these past couple months. This fall, I set up an appointment with Megan Chester, one of the wonderful counselors who help with the search. At our scheduled meeting, I brought her my resume, which we edited a few times, and she introduced to me to the online resources Holy Cross has to find internships. Crusader Connections is a database of internships offered directly to Holy Cross students by employers. Other databases available are the Liberal Arts Career Network, which several other liberal arts colleges subscribe to, and another called Vault. Once your resume is approved by Career Services, you can start writing cover letters and applying. While students looking into finance internships want to finish their search by the fall, internship applications for humanities students like myself are usually due from January-March.

Many available internships are unfortunately unpaid or underpaid. Thankfully, Career Services offers funding through a separate application process due in late January. The Charles Carroll Fellowship which I am involved in also offers funding towards civic internships. Every Holy Cross student should stop into Career Services at some point; they’ve been a tremendous help.

Besides academics, internships, and RA duties, I’ve also made some exciting future plans with Holy Cross friends! Six of us girls will be spending spring break in Malibu, California, and we recently secured an off-campus house for our senior year. I’m already thinking of decorating- life is moving fast!

Enjoy the rest of winter break and brace yourself for the January snow!

Amy

This entry was posted on Sunday, January 10th, 2016 at 9:15 pm and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.