Hi everyone, welcome to week 8!

I can’t believe it is my last week in Dublin. I had such an amazing time here it’s hard to think that it is time to leave. This week wasn’t how I had expected it to be, but it was memorable nevertheless, as it marked the end of an amazing journey. To start off with the unexpected, on Monday, when my co-worker and I went into work, we realized that the bathroom in the office was broken. This made working at the office a lot more complicated, and our supervisor ended up assigning us to work from home, so we left the office before our usual time and ended up working remotely the rest of the day. It was kind of sad that during our last week we had to work from home, as we had hoped the bathroom issue would have been fixed by the next day, but we were still able to make the most out of it through Zoom meetings and the work chat. I got the chance to finish working on the projects I was assigned and look back on all the other work I had helped with throughout the internship. It was interesting seeing the growth between who I was on the first day of the internship and who I was and what I had accomplished by the last day.

As I have mentioned in previous entries, I really admire my co-workers, and I learned a lot from them, especially when it comes to defining success and what it means to be successful. While I can’t speak for all the Irish work environments, the impression I got from my co-workers was that, in Ireland, being successful means having a good work-life balance and being able to adapt your job into your life goals while also helping others along the way. One example of this is my co-worker Diane. She used to be a teacher and now she works as the communication manager for the company. She graduated in fine arts and computer science and does things from updating the website to planning and posting the social media content for the company. While at the office with her, I got the chance to learn more about things I found interesting and skills that I might want to improve on when going back to school in the fall, like coding, for example.

In addition to being this amazing presence in the company, Diane is also a very present mother who cherishes her children and the time she gets to spend with her family, finding success in her hybrid schedule, which at the same time allows her to be in touch with co-workers and interns and to be present at home. It was interesting to see the importance placed on work-time balance and life outside of work, because I feel that in the United States, work often takes precedence in people’s lives, so getting to better understand this different perspective work-life balanced helped me figure out what I might want or not want when it comes to my future professional career. In addition to that, something I also noticed defines success in the office I worked at is to continuously seek improvement, never taking things for granted just because they are working okay. All throughout the internship, my supervisors would ask my and the other interns’ opinions on company matters where having student feedback would be important, and it really felt like our input was valued. It was nice to be able to contribute to the company. Sometimes as an intern, it can feel like you don’t know enough to contribute when in conversation with more experienced professionals, so it was nice to be reminded that our perspective and our input was valued and that we also had strong things to offer in the knowledge exchange in the office.

Later this week, everyone in the office who was available got together and we had a farewell lunch at a restaurant called Lennan’s Yard. It was raining a lot, but we managed to get to the restaurant and have a wonderful time, and thankfully, by the time we were leaving, it was sunny again (carrying a 5 euro umbrella through a windy day in Dublin has not worked out so well for me in the past). It was so much fun to get the opportunity to say goodbye to everyone and celebrate our time interning for the company. Our supervisors were thoughtful enough that they even got us interns a farewell card and a gift to remind us of Ireland and our time here. I can’t stress enough what an amazing experience this was. If you are ever considering participating in an experience abroad, DO IT!!