Lehigh Valley Economic Development Corporation (LVEDC) held its annual Lehigh Valley Internship Summit at DeSales University with a panel featuring members of Isett’s Project Management & Construction Services team. The Internship Summit, now in its fifth year, is intended to inform businesses about best practices and current trends in internship programs.
The panel discussion was focused on the importance of meaningful projects and offered advice about how to achieve that goal. Isett’s Alexander Arruda, CDT, Project Manager, and Karmon Bertie, Intern, shared their experience with working on meaningful projects at Isett. Bertie is a student at Pennsylvania College of Technology and previously spent time with Isett’s Construction Materials Testing department during his summer and winter breaks.
An excerpt of the panel discussion is included below, and you can read more about the event on LVEDC’s website.
The firm makes sure interns are making contributions to projects that are occurring in their specialty, whether that’s environmental science, construction management, or civil engineering, Arruda said. “What we don’t want is for the interns to come in with not a lot to do, a lot of paperwork, a lot of busy work,” he said. “And it just so happens that we build the communities around us in a meaningful way. And the interns get to contribute into that process directly. The work products that they produce get captured and brought into actual products.” Interns are on work sites performing tasks such as taking measurements and observations that they download into the system and then discuss with department heads.
Bertie said the projects he has worked on have been meaningful, and he has the support necessary to guide him. “I’ve done a lot of different things throughout the office such as bid reviews, spec writing, completion tickets, punch lists, reviews, field reports,” he said. Arruda said interns perform billable work, with Bertie’s name appearing on invoices, “which gives him a real sense of ownership and also really helps our firm.”