This week, I continued my internship with EISS. Now that I’ve been in this position for a few weeks, I feel like I have gained a good grasp of the expectations, processes, and social culture of the workplace. As I wrote about before, I work individually with children at the school on a personalized intervention plan. This week, I was fully transitioned as a one-on-one instructor for two kids, Leo, whom I wrote about last week, and Cian, a 3 year old who comes for the second session of the day. I have been able to get into such a great routine with the both of them, and feel like I’ve really come to have a thorough understanding of each of their nuances and needs. I love spending time with them and learning about their personalities. They make the day so much easier to get through!
Although working with Leo and Cian has been such a positive experience, I entered this internship program looking for a clinical psychology focused internship. I learned a lot working at EISS, specifically about the process and importance of developing and adapting individualized intervention plans. However, the internship in general ended up being pretty strictly early education, rather than developmental psychology, focused. Consequently, I am excited to share that I will be beginning a new internship with Dublin City University in their School of Psychology!
In my role, I will aid in conducting evidence-based research regarding animal-assisted intervention as a therapeutic treatment for pediatric cancer patients. This research is being produced in coordination with Cian’s Kennels, a charity organization that brings family pets into local Dublin hospitals to provide pediatric cancer patients with a sense of emotional relief during their extended hospital stays. I will have the opportunity to improve my scientific writing skills, learn qualitative research techniques, and participate in large-scale symposiums, speaker events, and psychological methods trainings. I am so eager to begin in this exciting role and for all of the new skills that I’ll gain and be able to bring back home with me.
Entering this new role, I feel that my work with EISS has well prepared me for the expectations and structure of engaging in an internship abroad. Specifically, a notable cultural difference that I have experienced working in Ireland is “high-context communication”. Compared to jobs I have had in the US, I have found that my role here has provided me with significantly less instruction and background information in regard to my responsibilities. This ambiguity is not an issue, though it has been a learning curve. I have fortunately not had a difficult time finding ways to navigate this. My supervisors have all been extremely kind, adaptable, and forgiving of any misunderstanding. I am able to ask questions, or even just for quick clarification, without any judgement or negative reinforcement. Because of how encouraging my work environment has been, I’ve found that I’ve been able to learn so much more each day, as I never feel any sort of hesitation to ask for help or for more context. I am hopeful that in my new role I’ll have the same positive experience as I did with EISS. From my initial conversations with my new supervisor, Dr. Lorraine Boran, I am very optimistic that this will be an equally encouraging and successful work environment!
Outside of my internship, I had a great time in Dublin this week! Nearly every day, I went to the beach and read on the shore. On my commute home from EISS, I get off of the train in Blackrock, and I have come to deeply enjoy walking around that part of town and spending time by the water.
On Sunday, my friends and I took the Dart to Seapoint Beach and enjoyed the warm weather. Unfortunately, the water was polluted from the recent storms and we were unable to swim, but regardless, we had a nice afternoon sitting on the shore and spending time together.
After Seapoint, we headed back to Blackrock for dinner and affogato, and then, you guessed it, we went back to the beach to enjoy our ice cream and watch the sunset. I truly do not think I could ever grow tired of spending time by the ocean. Kendall and I already have plans to go back this coming week.
I have a lot of new changes coming my way this upcoming week, which has me feeling both eager and nervous. I hope that everything goes well and that I can adjust to my new placement quickly.
Slán go fóill!