[It's the Interns] Civic Engagement is a bottom-up assurance that the democratic political system is a well-operated one.

It is always hard to say good bye!

Advancing Justice-Atlanta Summer Internship has come to a close. "it's the Interns" series continue with our interns who worked behind and in front of the scene to Build Power for Good in the South and their thoughts on the Internship.

By Yao Sun

·    What was your most memorable moment from the internship?

My most memorable moment was when I was waiting for a detainee at the Stewart Detention Center and I saw the plastic glass between the visitor’s room and the center inside. On the glass there were words scratched by the detainees and their visitors. 

·    What was an eye-opening, unexpected experience, challenges, or knowledge gained from the internship?

I learnt the skills of making professional phone calls from phone banking and making informational conversations with strangers from door-to-door canvassing. Those are the skills important to my future career and I could only gain those skills from hands-on experience.

·    Why do you believe it is important to be involved in Civic Engagement?

I think it is important to be involved in Civic Engagement because it is an effective way to participate in politics. Also, Civic Engagement is a bottom-up assurance that the democratic political system is a well-operated one. 

·    How do you hope to incorporate what you have learned this summer as you go forward?

I learned a lot this summer about how to work with my coworkers, our business partners and even strangers. I think I will incorporate the communication skills into my future career. 

·    What advice do you have for the future interns?

Try to talk to the people around you, either the staff members or other interns. You will find they are insightful and amazing persons and you will learn a great deal from your relationships with them. 

·    What unique skill set did you developed from the internship?

I developed the skills to cooperate with others and communicate with people from different walks of life.  

· What was the best Asian dish you had throughout the internship?

Indian food for sure! And the buttery Naan we had at the community banquet!

·    Why are you proud to work with the immigrant community?

It elevates my awareness of the legal and social status quo of immigrant. And I think their hardship and struggling in life is obscure to the public. 

[It's the Interns] To ignore the rights of the immigrant community is to ignore the identity of this country

It is always hard to say good bye!

Advancing Justice-Atlanta Summer Internship has come to a close. "it's the Interns" series continue with our interns who worked behind and in front of the scene to Build Power for Good in the South and their thoughts on the Internship.

By Leslie Wang

·    What was your most memorable moment from the internship?

It was when the interns were visiting the Center for Civil and Human Rights, I put my hands on a counter and put on headphones. Through the headphones was a mimic of the situations that could happen at a demonstration, where policemen could be shouting and protesters arguing and crying. Never been to a protest before, I realized for the first time how hard it could be for a peaceful demonstration to take place and the training that were needed by the protesters.

·    What was an eye-opening, unexpected experience, challenges, or knowledge gained from the internship?

After gained more insightful knowledge about the Civil Rights Movement in the 60s and heard detailed stories about the freedom riders, it was an amazing experience to meet the Dream Riders of 2015 at the Georgia capitol. Seeing young adults at my age who grew up in the United States but were unfairly treated because they were undocumented, I admired their courage to talk about their stories and their determination to fight for what the rights that were belonged to them.

·    Why do you believe it is important to be involved in Civic Engagement?

As an international student, I always voted at my college, no matter how small the elections were. Because I knew the international student body was not trivial, it was important to incorporate our voices and needs into the policy making process at our school. If I did not say anything, I did not believe anyone else would speak for me. The same logic applied to being citizens, which involves more serious and down-to-earth issues. If a citizen did not engage, no other person would fight for the rights for him or her. Therefore, it was important for citizens to be civically engaged.

·    How do you hope to incorporate what you have learned this summer as you go forward?

I could be a quiet person if I were at a new place. It was fine when I was attending new classes at school. However, I learned that at workplace, it was very important for co-workers to speak up their opinion and to communicate with each other, so that unnecessary misunderstandings could be avoided. At this work, I always made sure that my partners expressed themselves and I expressed myself fully, instead of making conjectures or pretending that I knew what they needed.

·    What advice do you have for the future interns?

It was an important experience for me to use the things I learned from our staffs and our work to understand the lives and conditions of people with whom I met in my life. I noticed that there were so many situations and possibilities of lives of which I was not aware, and I learned to respect and to listen to that differences. I hope if the future interns could get the same experiences we had, you could bring the knowledge into your life and use it.

·    What unique skill set did you developed from the internship?

As a native Chinese speaker, I did not thought of translating my first language as a challenge, but the reality contradicted me. It took me a long time to translate flyers, menus or posters from English to Chinese. Besides the literary meaning, I had to take into the consideration that their lives were to a very large extent different from their lives in China, and made the translation more applicable to the situations here.

· What was the best Asian dish you had throughout the internship?

No doubt it were the naans we had at Clarkston Municipal Dinner at Kathmandu Kitchen and Grill.

·    Why are you proud to work with the immigrant community?

Because the United States is an immigrant country where the majority of citizens either had immigrant heritage or were immigrant themselves, to ignore the rights of immigrant community is to ignore a part of the identity of this country, of which every member in this society should be proud of.

[It's the Interns] How to be a responsible voice for the people.

It is always hard to say good bye!

Advancing Justice-Atlanta Summer Internship has come to a close. "it's the Interns" series continue with our interns who worked behind and in front of the scene to Build Power for Good in the South and their thoughts on the Internship.

By Saisha Mediratta

·    What was your most memorable moment from the internship?

I think my most memorable moment was going to the Dream Riders conference. It was a chance to meet students around our age fighting so passionately for a cause we believe in. I think the Dream Riders represented unity and solidarity even with so many different nationalities. Talking to them and listening to their stories was an eye-opening experience, and I not only was able to witness a great movement, but also make some new friends.  

·    What was an eye-opening, unexpected experience, challenges, or knowledge gained from the internship?

I think what was “eye-opening” was how organic the whole process was. If someone felt passionate about an issue relating to civic engagement or the Asian-American community, she could do something about it. It could be in the form of an article, a blog post, an infographic, further research or building upon an older initiative. I realized there is always something you can do even if it as basic as raising awareness. 

·    Why do you believe it is important to be involved in Civic Engagement?

I think it is very easy to shift the blame to politicians and people who have a more public mouth piece to voice their opinions. However ultimately it is the people who make the decision of who they are going to give those privileges to. The only way to ensure that our leaders are representative of what the majority of his/her constituents stand for is to voice what we stand for, and that could be something as basic as voting.  

·    How do you hope to incorporate what you have learned this summer as you go forward?

I have learned a lot from Advancing Justice on how to be a responsible voice for the people. I hope to continue working on increasing civic engagement, and most importantly inform others of the problems facing our community. We often get undermined because of the model minority myth even though our struggle as immigrants is much more complex than that. 

·    What advice do you have for the future interns?

Make the most of your internship. Take every opportunity to help with something or do work because there is no replacement for experience. Because of all the responsibility placed on us as interns, we get an opportunity to be a part of the larger cause and picture in a big way. There are so many facets to the work we do that it is almost impossible not to learn something new every day. 

·    What unique skill set did you developed from the internship?

I think I have developed patience in a lot of different ways. A large majority of the material we work on is part of a more long term goal. One canvass may not make a difference, but multiple over the next three months will achieve larger results. Additionally with the civic engagement work, being patient with people especially when we are interacting with over 30 in one canvass and many more in a phone banking session. 

· What was the best Asian dish you had throughout the internship?

Without intending to offend any of my Korean brothers and sisters, I am not a big fan of Korean food, and the only other Asian food I had was Indian. So my final answer is: I loved Global Mall’s chicken 65 and The Palace’s Makhni Chicken. 

·    Why are you proud to work with the immigrant community?

I am proud to work with the immigrant community because it really represents a group of hardworking people striving to provide a better life for their families. I think there is a unique passion among the immigrant community because we look to America as a privilege and a land of opportunity as cliché as a sounds.