Fiveable Founding Member Experience

Checking your email frequently is something that many educators and professionals recommend students do, especially in the summer. I, as the self identified planner and organization queen that I am, always check my email. I probably check it three times a day at least. I’m very thankful for these antics because if I was like most teenagers and didn’t check my email, I probably would have missed out on one of the most amazing experiences of my young life.

When I first got the email from Fiveable about their internship program, my first inclination was it was too good to be true. In the weeks previous to receiving the email, I was trying to figure out what I was going to do for the summer. With the coronavirus pandemic cancelling most summer activities, I had no idea what I could be doing. The internship program I wanted to apply to through my school district was cancelled. I thought about getting a job, but worried about being exposed to people when it was advised to stay home if you could. I felt lost and overwhelmed about being “behind.”

Then came the Fiveable email. It was everything I could have wanted to be doing with my time. A remote internship for a company that I loved and already used that has people who are motivated and love school just like I do. I applied for both the content intern and content curator position because I figured I would have a better shot at getting something if I applied for two things.

A few days later, I received an email saying that I did not get the internship, but that I been selected for a new program they were setting up called Founding Members. As a Founding Member, you would help Fiveable build a community and do projects with a group. I was excited to be chosen and felt that my summer had a purpose beyond binge watching Netflix.

My teammates and I got along really well. It was crazy to be with a group of people who were so similar to me and yet lived totally different lives than I did. Usually, during school, I dislike group projects because the work is unevenly distributed. I was worried the first week since our first project was a group project. I was pleasantly surprised when everyone wanted to contribute and be apart of the planning. It was refreshing and just showed me all the amazing things you can accomplish when you are put together with people who have similar motivations.

One of my favorite aspects of this summer has been the community created. With the coronavirus causing schools to close, I felt very isolated and alone my final weeks at school. I didn’t realize how much school meant to me in a social way until I was unable to see my friends in classes everyday. At Fiveable, I was able to feel this sense of sociability without having to leave my house. Not only was I able to make friends with the people in my group, but I was able to met people with specific interests in the different Slack channels.

From my experience in Fiveable, I was able to explore different avenues that I would never have thought about. I have always enjoyed business classes, but had never thought about it beyond the material we learned in class. At Fiveable, I was able to take what I had learned at school and use it in a real setting with a real company. I was able to be creative and learn about digital marketing and web features (like SEO). It was incredible to gain all this knowledge from the projects and the people I had met.

Although the internship like program was not paid, I feel I learned more from this experience than I could from any part time job. During this summer, I learned real world skills like communication and networking that you don’t get from places like school. I was also able to get tips on how to make my profiles on sites like Linkedin and even Twitter more professional and make future employers want to hire me.

If any student is thinking about signing up for a future Fiveable program or any internship that is a bit out of their comfort/skill zone, I would tell them to do it. You will always wonder what could have happened if you would have put yourself out there, why not just do it?

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