Nine Interns Teach at the Academy During 2015-16 School Year

This past year, the Academy hired a total of nine interns, their job titles ranging from administrative intern of the Office of Multicultural Affairs (OMA), to Lamont Gallery intern, to computer science instructor. These interns spent one year at the Academy, learning the day-to-day intricacies of their position, handling a barrage of job-related and co-curricular responsibilities and adjusting to dorm life.

Of the nine interns, six of them, Christine Bradley, Colleen Brockmyre, Alex Gendal, Brittany Hawkins and Wendy Mellin are teaching interns in the health, computer science, theater and dance, physical education and English departments, respectively. The other three—Lamont Gallery intern Olivia Knauss, intern of the OMA Danielle Lucero and admissions intern Jill Lyon—work in other parts of the Academy.

“It reminded me of my favorite classes from college, I ‘found my voice’ in this kind of learning environment and was excited to hear about this Harkness approach for high school.”

The interns this year came from a wide range of backgrounds, some having just completed their undergraduate programs at university, others having noticed a local job listing that they decided to accept. The rest have used this year as a stepping stone to start their professional careers.

Danielle Lucero, the administrative intern of the OMA, discovered the opportunity to work at Exeter through her mentor at Columbia University’s Office of Undergraduate Admissions, who was the regional representative for New England Boarding schools in the office.

“One day he saw me stressing out about my life after graduation and he printed out two applications,” she said. “One was for Phillips Andover and one was for Phillips Exeter.”

Lucero had never heard of these two schools before this event, as she is grew up in the Southwest on a Native American reservation. Given the history of boarding schools for Native Americans, Lucero explained that her connotation with the concept had not always been positive. “For indigenous people, boarding schools represent reform school and cultural assimilation,” she said.

She decided, however, to look into the opportunity, and through talking with her colleagues and researching the schools themselves, she chose to apply to Exeter for a job in the OMA, a position that wasn’t available at Andover at the time.

Once she arrived at the Academy, she was immediately surprised by the relative lack of diversity she found on campus. Coming from New York City, Lucero had adapted to being a minority in an area that cultivated so many different identities, and there, she learned about understanding difference and cultural competency skills. However, she was shocked to realize that Exeter was so different than what she had previously encountered. “I figured since I survived Manhattan I [could] make it anywhere,” she said.

With the help of her mentor on campus, Dean of Multicultural Affairs Rosanna Salcedo, Lucero was able to use this initial culture shock as a tool to help her learn more about what drives the different cultural spaces here on campus, as well as the ethnic aspects and backgrounds of the students, staff and faculty of the Academy.

“Being at Exeter has taught me that not everyone is comfortable having those conversations [about race, culture and ethnicity], and that’s okay,” she said. “You have to meet people where they are at and help them on their journey to understanding a different perspective.”

While Lucero was understanding the cultural and ethnic landscape of the Academy, Wendy Mellin was learning how to teach, and interact, around a Harkness table as an English instructor.

Mellin was originally drawn to the Academy through an Exeter alumnus who had explained the concept of Harkness: a group of 12 or 13 students sitting around a table, discussing a shared text. She was immediately intrigued by this style of community-based learning.

“It reminded me of my favorite classes from college,” she said. “I ‘found my voice’ in this kind of learning environment and was excited to hear about this Harkness approach for high school.”

In contrast to Lucero who embarked on the Exeter career with no prior training specifically tailored to her work at the Academy, Mellin attended the Exeter Humanities Institute (EHI) last June, where she explored the the use of student-centered, discussion-based education. Due to this training, Mellin felt very well-equipped for her position, recognizing the responsibilities that it bore.

For her, however, the hardest thing was finding the balance between the to the day-to-day responsibilities of her Exeter life: being active with both students, faculty and staff outside of the classroom, as well as fulfilling her job description—teaching and sitting in on multiple classes every day. Mellin felt that as the year progressed and her schedule became more consistent, she had an easier experience balancing her time. “The busier I was the easier it was to get into the rhythm of the school,” she said.

Looking back on her year spent at the Academy, Mellin has come to realize that, most importantly, she has learned about listening and the power of stories. Having attended meditation for the first time early in the fall term, she felt grateful for the speaker who presented her story, as well as for the community opening its’ ears and listening intentionally and openly to it.

“Meditation is my favorite part of the week because we gather to pause together and to listen together,” she said.

Alex Gendal, a teaching intern in the theater and dance department, originally heard about his job opportunity—the description of which promoted the lighting design as well as the teaching of students—through a backstage theater job site.

Gendal found the opportunity to both teach and design at the same time to be a “a wonderful stepping stone toward the beginning of [his] career,” and hopes to teach part-time at the collegiate level in years to come.

Gendal, who graduated from college last summer and used his internship as a way to become a more independent adult, soon realized after starting his work at the Academy that there weren’t enough hours in the day to complete all that he wanted to do. “Time management would be the most important skill to have, considering how many hats the Exeter faculty wear," he said.

Although many of the interns had different teaching, and learning experiences, they have taken away moments that will not only help them succeed in their future endeavors, but have also helped them mature as citizens of the educational community.

“Overall, what I will take away from my time at Exeter is the love and commitment it takes from faculty and staff to make Exeter a home and a place to thrive for all students,” Lucero said. “That is probably the best lesson I learned here, that empathy, compassion and love are essential for a successful school.”