What is the CAUSE Internship?
Cause is a 4 week long paid internship geared towards rising juniors and seniors in the Durango community interested in learning digital marketing skills and branding for local nonprofits. CAUSE is through the Community Foundation Serving Southwest Colorado and Business Education Connection, this is the third year. Interns will learn marketing skills, go to seminars with community professionals, work 35 hours a week to grow personally, professionally, and gain real world work experience, while leaving a positive impact on a local non-profit.
What is SASO?
For my local nonprofit I was pared with SASO or the Sexual Assault Services Organization, due to my personal interests and passion about the work that they do. SASO offers different free services to help in the healing process of survivors of sexual assault. Such as a 24-hr support hotline, survivor support groups, along with law enforcement, criminal justice, and forensic medical advocacy. They also are working toward doing more cultural outreach and prevention education within local schools and the community. Their mission: SASO offers survivors of sexual violence support, compassion, hope, and healing. We work to end sexual violence through survivor-led advocacy and prevention education that recognizes the connections between oppression and sexual violence.
Originally established as the Rape Intervention Team in 1977, SASO has grown into opening an Ignacio Office and a Clinic at Fort Lewis Collage.
Originally established as the Rape Intervention Team in 1977, SASO has grown into opening an Ignacio Office and a Clinic at Fort Lewis Collage.
Final Take-AwaysThroughout my internship at SASO I learned many assorted things that I deeply appreciate about this opportunity. One of the most valuable things I enjoyed about this internship was working for something I am passionate about. I care deeply about the SASO mission and seeing it follow through within our community because it is something that can affect me and the people I care about. This gave me a way to give back to the community and benefit this local non-profit while also being a learning opportunity to me. Another unique experience within this internship was the chance to network with professionals in the area. I had the opportunity to pick the brains of real leaders in Durango who are making change within the business world. I also was able to learn new skills I am interested in, in a way that applies to my life outside of school. For example learning how to use canva, task managing, and editing software through marketing creation. This is also the first all day paid real world job experience I have had. Which allowed me to see what it is like to work all day, everyday, no matter the time of year. Along with all of that this was also an opportunity to challenge myself outside of school. Due to the fact that this was not required by any one or anything, it has been a place where I can challenge myself against myself. Go into my npo everyday and try to do better than the day before and find a way to benefit their mission.
Over the course of my time at SASO, there are many different lessons and skills I learned, both marketing techniques and new work skills. Some of the more technical skills I mastered were identifying a brand, content creation on canva, and worked on my video editing skills. Along with skills to develop a specific brand, look, and feel to an organization also learning strategies to find your target market. I work on my digital organization skills in a few different ways, first using a platform called Asana to track my tasks and progression. I also organized endless photos and documents in a shared drive and my google drive. Due to where I was placed, this internship handled some pretty heavy topics. This made me have to take time for myself in order to process and be able to come back and support. While I was at SASO a large number of our staff was either sick, traveling, or working from home, so I was unable to be with my mentor the entire time. This taught me to be able to adapt to surprises with a positive attitude, and it will all work itself out. Along with that, it is important to deal with tasks as soon as possible so they dont spiral out of control. Or in case circumstances change that stop you from doing what you need to do. In the midst of completing this internship, I faced many challenges that forced me to adapt and try again. At many points during my internship, Laura the Executive Director of SASO was gone due to travel, work, or sickness, which forced to shadow a different member of the team. While this wasn't that big of a deal, it was a little annoying to not have all the answers I needed. Instead of just giving up on the information or help I needed, I would ask everyone in the office, and if that didn't work then I would google it. Another small challenge I faced was no one was working specifically on marketing, so I had to collect all of the information from a lot of different sources in the office. It just made stepping into this role a little confusing. Although after some organization it will be a lot easier for someone to step into this role. The last challenge I faced was a feeling of burn out. Due to the fact I moved right into this after a long junior year, I was feeling the toll of working so much. Evidently I feel like this was really beneficial in the long run because it gets me used to working a long week for the rest of my life. |
My Role at SASODuring the CAUSE internship, there were 2 main roles I took on. Monday and Friday we were in a Pueblo Community Collage classroom, meeting with different business professionals from around the community. In order to learn from them about their careers and how they got there, different branding and social media marketing strategies/platforms/techniques, and overall advice as we are planning out the next portion of our lives. Then Tuesdays thru Thursdays we would be applying the skills we were learning that week, at our local nonprofits in order to boost their social media presence. CAUSE had us work on our NPO's Colorado Gives Campaign, and a campaign of our choosing. We were asked to make a creative brief to plan out our campaigns and make corresponding different media across platforms. Along with that, I made a brand package for SASO with all of their brand elements such as their fonts, colors, and commonly used logos.
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