Hey everyone, I'm back again. For those who haven't read my previous blog - I'm completing my internship at the Shire of Kalamunda in the PR dept and so far its been one great learning experience.
Within my first week of my internship, my manager straight away
threw me into the deep end and Bang! Bang! Bang! All these emails were coming
in and flooding my mailbox. “Hi Kiran, could you please write a media release
on the following… Thanks, Nic.”
Don’t get me wrong, I was grateful that I was getting a list
of jobs to complete which was putting all my skills and knowledge from uni into
use and initially it was just a little overwhelming but I quickly picked up my
pace.
During my first 2 weeks at the Shire, my main focus was on
the creation of a media release, brochures, flyers and application packs for
the Youth Arts Fest Exhibition (YAFE). The event is catered to the youth of
Kalamunda to have their art works exhibited, be it paintings, photographs, sculptures
or fashion designs. The exhibition will be open to the public and judged by a
panel with up to $1,000 of cash prizes to be won.
The program used to create the artwork and design for the
brochures and flyers is called “InDesign”. My manager Nic asked me if I have
ever used the program before, as it’s the program they used to create all their
designs, but unfortunately I hadn’t. Nic asked me what programs we used in
class but was a bit disappointed that we hadn’t been shown how to use this
specific program in uni as a large number of PR practitioners and marketing
companies use it A LOT.
Anyway, my next half hour was spent trying to familiarise
myself with the program and use my creativity skills to design a flyer on my
own – however I didn’t have much luck. The great thing about working within a
small team, especially with Nicole, is that although I may not have ever used
the InDesign program before, she let me try and figure it out on my own first
and then she took the time to show me how to use it and together we worked on
the draft design. The program is so in-depth and creative I was amazed since
the most I’ve ever used is Microsoft publisher.
I think that its important for us as students to learn some
of the basics when it comes to software programs that PR companies regularly
use – it would’ve come in handy as I may have had the opportunity to design
more marketing/pr material during my internship. Plus, that would mean that we
wouldn’t have to use valuable time in learning the software (when we’re out in
the real world) and can instead jump straight into work and learn the new
details.
However nonetheless, my first few weeks of interning were
great. I got more comfortable with writing media releases and instead of
spending maybe just over an hour on each release, I started picking up the pace
and gaining confidence in my writing, which ultimately shortened my turn around
time per release - which was awesome and exactly what my manager was looking
for.
After writing countless media releases for the Shire on
their upcoming events there was one question that was on my mind… Taking into
account the size of the shire and the events that it hosts (which is really
quite a lot) - what does my local shire do for us? I never hear of any events,
mens workshops, kids story time readings, kids holiday activities, music
programs… nothing. I guess its time to start researching and find out what’s
been happening!
- K
