My Junior Internship was at the Department of Family Services over in Fairfax county about an hour away from my house. This being my first internship I was so excited to get out into the field and to learn as much as I could about what professional social workers looked like and how they handled their work. For my first experience of social work, I learned so many things, but working in a department inside of a cubicle isn’t really for me. Despite this fact this internship definitely taught me about how social workers conduct themselves and how they are able to maintain a strong balance of self care and work.
One of the main things I saw at DFS was teamwork. Each worker kept in constant communication and talked with each other constantly about what they may need for their next case or how they could better improve their own strengths and weaknesses as a team. With there being so many different branches I was able to shadow I got to see how each different branch even worked with volunteers and just brought them right onboard to the team to help them and to be able to help the people in each particular case or scenario.
My supervisor was also a massive help. She was so nice and she had no problem providing feedback on what I could be doing better. With each piece of feedback I was able to improve and grow as a person in this field and without her guidance I wouldn’t be able to understand half as much as I do right now. So overall, This internship was definitely a great start to my social work career!