Hello again!

I have finished my first week with Green Light! I only work Monday-Thursdays and this Monday was Memorial Day, so it was quite a short week. I have really enjoyed my first week. By the looks of it I am definitely going to be getting lots of experience with fundraising and campaigning. Both things I am hoping to learn more about in my learning objectives. Stated simply, my learning objectives are pretty concise. I want to learn effective vocabulary, language, and tools to help gain attention and support in fundraising. I want to practice and observe effective office communication techniques. This will be my first time working in an office setting and I am hoping to learn effective tools of communication, especially between superiors and those who work under them. Finally, since I am working for an environmental non profit, I am hoping to learn techniques to make my lifestyle more environmentally friendly! I am conscious of how my actions impact the environment, but I think there is a lot I can learn to make my behaviors more impactful.

Im looking forward to working on the projects I have ahead. My work will be focused around writing campaigns to promote different fundraising efforts and to find local businesses, organizations, and individuals to partner with and help us continue to help people and the city of New Orleans.

Thats all for now!

Leigh

Hi Everyone,

Well my internship doesn’t officially start until next week when I am back in the country, but I’m getting more and more excited everyday! The NOLA Locavores are hosting their 4th annual Eat Local Challenge this summer, where participants who registered are challenged to consume food products that have only been grown and produced within a 200 mile radius of New Orleans. The challenge is difficult, and lasts for the entire month of June.

I personally participated last June in a series of events our organization hosted to encourage local eating throughout the city of New Orleans, which is pretty lucky place to be eating local if you ask me. I look forward to pushing myself to be even more local this time around, even though I can’t say I’ll be able to follow a strict 100% local diet like the hard core people that come out every year. There are so many wonderful reasons to eat locally sourced food, which I plan to go into detail about in a later post.

ELC 2014 on Facebook!

Will report more when I’m back on the ground in NOLA, until then, get your appetites warmed up!

 

-Simone

Hi all!

Today was my first day at Green Light New Orleans. My position is the Assistant Membership Coordinator at Green Light New Orleans–an environmental non profit that works on sustainability and reducing the carbon footprint in the greater New Orleans area. This basically means I will be assisting the Director of Development in fundraising and development goals. Some examples of those tasks are promotional events, running the membership program, and finding new sources of donations/funding. Green Lights main task since its birth in 2007 has been installing energy efficient light bulbs in residents homes. I volunteered with GLNO through my sorority in the winter of 2013 and loved the organization, its mission, and its design. I knew I wanted to work for them, so I hopped on the opportunity this summer.

My first day went great. I was definitely overdressed but relieved to look around and see the more casual-yet-professional apparel of my coworkers. I am happy to dress it down. Since it was only my first day, I do not have a huge amount to report back, but I thought I would take the time to tell you guys about the history of GLNO. Green Light was started by Andreas Hoffman. Andreas, originally from Switzerland, was touring with his band in Europe and decided he needed to do something to offset the carbon footprint his band had created due to their tour. After some calculations and generous donations from friends, Andreas returned to New Orleans and replaced friends and neighbors light bulbs with the energy efficient CFL bulbs. Word got out and more friends and even strangers asked him to do the same in their homes. From there, Green Light was born! This organization was a happy accident and indeed, happy it was! So far, Green Light has replaced bulbs in 23,000 homes, saved 23 million dollars in monthly utility costs, and greatly decreased the carbon footprint of these homes and the city of New Orleans. Today I met with my supervisor Rachel. After going over the details of the internship we went through tasks and jobs I would be responsible for this summer. It was fun, productive, and informative to talk about these tasks and trade ideas. Be on the look out for promotions of the 10% night at The Blue Jeans Bar (date to be determined)–my first task!!

I will check back in at the end of the week with more details about my first week and my objectives for the summer.

Thanks for reading!

Leigh

Over the course of the summer, readers will have the opportunity to follow 30 Tulane University students as they share their stories about life as an intern. Our blog authors will be located in 15 different cities in the U.S. and abroad. If you want to learn about internships from the perspective of a Tulane student then this blog is for you! The wish is that you will find the posts inspiring, encouraging, and full of helpful tips and advice.

Good luck to our blog authors this summer and thank you in advance for sharing your stories!

Sincerely,

Allen Thomas, Ph.D., Assistant Director – Experiential Engagement, Center for Engaged Learning and Teaching (CELT)