My name is Olfa Ait Siselmi and this summer I had the opportunity to work as an intern for Equitas, a non-profit which specializes in human rights with their Canadian Team. I am starting at the beginning of the Fall 2022 semester my third and final year as a 69热视频 student. I will be completing a degree in Liberal Arts with a minor in Social Entrepreneurship and Russian language.
The organization I was interning with has for mission to, through education, advance equality, social justice, and respect for human dignity throughout Canada and around the world. Equitas uses a participative approach to advance its mission. The team I was working for, the Canadian team, has, as a goal, to promote human rights for children and youth through cooperation with partners across Canada. To do so, they provide formations, toolkits, and financial supports to assure that educating and empowering young folks is possible.
During this internship, my goal was to expand on how to promote and advocate for the freedom of children and youth. To find ways and tools that will allow them to protect themselves, think for themselves and advocate through community action projects.
As one of my main interests lies in the ways in which we can help people have agency over their own bodies and experiences, Equitas was a great way to learn about how we can help others nurture human rights and keep that connecting thread allowing the next person to learn. Throughout this internship, my learning objectives were to expend on how it is possible to have strong social impact, the underside of NGO鈥檚 and how teamwork works with people who work in an organization that is trying to destroy a hierarchical form of work.
As an intern, my responsibilities rotated around the program officer and the education specialists. Thus, my responsibilities were divided between the program鈥檚 management, the development of educational tools and communications. Indeed, my duties included assisting the education specialists in reviewing and updating education tools such as some workshops and a workbook about the 17 Sustainable Development Goals. I also had the opportunity to revise texts in both English and French, create some content for their social media and their website. I was also responsible for doing some research about funding, caterers, partners, and other subjects relating to Equitas鈥� work. Overall, I was lucky enough to oversee my work and have a certain independence in the way I work, but still have support.
I will harbor only great memories from this internship since the team was only welcoming and kind to me throughout the summer. The first highlight of this internship is how I assisted the first in-person workshop the Canadian team has conducted since the pandemic. With this experience, I witnessed how Equitas created a learning space where they give tools, a place to share and learn to partners from different organizations. Seeing and helping with that was a tremendous honor since it allowed me to understand how sharing knowledge works. Another highlight from this internship was a learning event that happened with every team of Equitas. This learning event allowed me to meet people from different parts of the organization that I didn鈥檛 have the opportunity to work with and to share knowledge and opinions on different subjects relating to human rights. Another memorable moment from the internship was the Canadian team meeting where for an hour, colleagues could share anything relating to work but also share some fun facts and details from their lives. It was a great way to witness amicability and the company鈥檚 culture of the Canadian team across the country.
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In terms of challenges, I think that working from home can be a bit limiting with all the possible distractions and managing my time as effectively as possible can also be a challenge. For example, when I am given several tasks for the week, sometimes determining what is more important can be a challenge and handing in work that has weight and meaning can feel like a challenge. I also know that some tasks take me a little longer to hand in because they are things that probably drive me a little less. Which can be a challenge. To overcome them, there always was some support from the Equitas team to make sure everything was fine with me. Planning was also a big part of overcoming losing myself in the work. As for the distractions, working from the office was a way to make sure I was in an environment that was conducive to work.
Unfortunately, I will not receive academic credit for my internship. However, the experience itself, the knowledge gained, and the professional environment in which Equitas is established fit with several of my professional goals. The academic knowledge I gained from the internship and the immense opportunity to work in the non-profit sector were still very helpful and enriching to me. This internship allowed me to see more concretely the reality of human rights, as well as the reality that young people in Canada still experience because of the social and economic barriers that still shape the Canadian political narrative.
The academic impact of this internship is also very eye opening as I have developed new interests that I did not think I had. This will shape my final academic year in a more concrete and constructive way. With the help of the internship, I found that I had a strong interest about human rights relating to the online sphere, as well as the processes by which education can help. Furthermore, my university experience will be changed by new perspectives and understanding of what I want to do. There is also a way in which the freedom and the trust that was given to me by Equitas helped me to rebuild some efficiency and structure in my work. I come out of these three months with a new background, new interests and new passions that will bring me closer to what I want to become and to the human being I have always wanted to be.
Finally, I would like to thank Mr. Brown who established the Hon. Paul & Yvonne Casey Arts Internship Award as well as the 69热视频 Arts Internship Office for this incredible opportunity that gave me knowledge and experience that I could not have had elsewhere.
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