Being An Internship Supervisor: Day One
I am not ready. I thought I would be in a better place than this, but being sick the last week of school really threw my schedule off. I neglected to tell HR that the intern was coming - I did arrange for training, but completely did not get to HR. I am hoping that I can get the intern to HR without a hitch, but they are a bit scattered over there, so who knows who to even talk to these days. Anyway, the assignment calendar is finished. I still want and need to print off things for the new special project and make the space a bit more intern friendly, but I should be able to do that before the intern arrives at the facility.
I am assuming that the music therapy room is a mess. I asked folks to put things back in the room when they were finished with them after graduation and field day. I have not been back to the facility since graduation morning when I was kicked out and sent home. I am hoping that I will be able to put things together without too much effort as I am not completely better. I have to figure out three music therapy sessions before yet another field day starts up. It is country of the month day, so I should produce a presentation about Sweden. We will see if I can get to it this morning. If not, then we can do some games during music therapy this week.
The first day of any intern's time with me is a day of uncertainty. There is uncertainty on both sides of this new relationship - mine and theirs. I get scared about whether the intern will like me, the facility, the clients, what we do, and all that. For them, there are so many more things to be nervous about.
I don't remember much about the first day that I arrived at my internship. The entire experience has a glow about it. I know that I was excited as all get out to get started. I am sure that I was also nervous beyond belief. There was lots to get through - information, routines, and all that stuff. I try to remember those feelings when I welcome a new intern to my program.
Today is a strange day to welcome an intern. We are going to have about 30 minutes before the first session. After three sessions in a row, we will start up the next field day experience. I am hoping that I do not have a big role in this field day as I need to get my intern's HR stuff out of the way. The afternoon will be taken up by field day stuff, so we will be missing one music therapy group today. I have no individuals scheduled at the moment, so we will not be missing out on those sessions. That is something else that I was going to do the last week of school.
I am so far behind.
It is only 5am, but I am feeling anxious about how unprepared I am for this new intern. Unfortunately, heading to work early will not make anything happen any faster. The HR folks won't be at work until 8 at the earliest, so getting to work early will not do anything other than give me time to arrange and rearrange things until the intern arrives. I will be leaving earlier than usual, but not at 5am. There are two weeks of emails to go through, a mess to clean up, and an intern's first day to arrange.
The rest of the week is planned. The intern will be in training for the rest of the week which gives me a chance to introduce the idea of an intern to my clients. Many of my clients are used to the idea of an intern, but we haven't had one since February, so some clients have no idea what an intern is or what they do at the facility.
This intern does not have a senior intern. At this point in time, this intern does not have a junior intern, either. I have had interns all by themselves before, but I prefer it when an intern has at least one other intern around during their internships. That hasn't worked out, yet. I had offered a position to an applicant that I felt ambiguous about - the applicant refused the position. (That's a whole other blog post - one I've probably written about before - being rejected by an applicant.) I am glad that the applicant rejected the position - I was not really all that interested in being their internship director. They did not feel interested in my clients - just interested in being close to home.
I am looking forward to working with this intern. I hope that the experience I can offer will be what the intern needs to be a successful therapist in their future. I am trying to make those things happen, but who knows? Looking into the future is an inexact science, but one that I am interested in...
That reminds me. I need to record a futurist presentation for the World Congress. If you are going to the World Congress and are interested in clinical training and education, please consider being part of my workshop on Wednesday at 10ish.
It is now 5:25am. I figure I can work here at home for about another 30 minutes before heading out into the world. Once I get to work, I will focus on resetting the closet where the intern has a real desk (no more card table!!). I will put things back where they belong before I head up front to greet my new intern. I will wade through my emails, try to get some individual sessions set up, and then figure out what I am going to do with my clients this morning and the rest of the week.
I am still coughing and not feeling my best. I am under strict instructions to reserve my energy so I don't end up with pneumonia or something else. I would like to have some sort of session that engages my clients with limited energy on my end of things, but we will see what actually happens. I am already tired and coughing more than I want to cough, but that's part of all of this. I cannot miss any time, so I will need to conserve my strength as much as I can in the next several weeks. Fortunately, we are in our summer schedule, so I have Fridays off. This gives me a bit more time to relax than during the regular school year.
Time to work off these jitters. Welcome, intern.
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