One of the cool things about Kyle's Scholarship is the stipend that he can access to support a summer as an unpaid intern at some company, presumably to get experience related to his major. Basically, they will give him $4,000 so that he doesn't have to work at Wal-Mart or some such place to make spending money for the upcoming school year. This being "technically" his last summer off from school, he had to access it or lose it. Back in January, we started to periodically ask him what he needed to do to set that up. Of course the answer was always "I've got plenty of time".
Well, it turns out that there was a deadline to getting all the paperwork turned in - including finding the place that you were going to work at - back in April. He actually realized it about a week beforehand and tried to meet with his advisor and people at the career center but with tennis matches and practice, he didn't make it.
I was none too pleased with his procrastination and I sure as heck didn't want to leave $4,000 on the table so I called the career people to see what we could do. Well, after explaining that most kids get their summer internships lined up in February, the lady said that the deadline wasn't that critical and he could still access his stipend. He just needed to find something - quick. He got a list of potential places and sent his resume around to them. I also contacted some people that I knew to see if they needed anyone. It wouldn't have anything to do with History but the lady said it didn't have to be directly related so I figured what the heck. Kyle even asked me if maybe EMC might "hire" him so I checked there too. My other sources didn't need anyone and EMC doesn't do unpaid internships. He hadn't heard back from anyone either so it was looking pretty bad.
One of the things our group at EMC does each year is volunteer in some community project. Last year, we worked on houses for the Habitat for Humanity and this year, we planted crops at the Community Harvest Project farm that feeds many hundreds of people in central Mass. They are always looking for volunteer coordinators - people to manage the volunteer planters and workers that they have come in and help - so I mentioned it to Kyle. He was interested and, since it was the only game in town, called them up and arranged to meet with them. A couple of days before he was to head to the farm, he said that he got an email from the Massachusetts Historical Society saying that they could use an intern! After a few negotiations back and forth he was in (and told the farmers to pound sand).
Well, the Mass Historical Society is conveniently located in downtown Boston so Kyle had to figure out how to get there... We found their website and got directions (which say, by the way, that parking is horendous and you really should take public transit). We plugged the location into the GPS and it says it will take about an hour to get there. We figure he should leave at 7:00 am to get there for his 9:00 appointment.
The next day, at 6:50 am, not hearing Kyle stirring, I went into his room to find him fast asleep. "What's up" he says. "It's 6:50." "Crap. My alarm didn't go off." So, he ambles out of bed and proceeds to leisurly get ready. I'm practically helping him put his clothes on and he's just casual as can be. He finally says "Would you just relax. I've got plenty of time." He finally rolls out of the driveway at about 7:20.
I head in to work and Deb calls me at about 8:30 asking if I've heard anything from him yet. Nope. I send him a text message asking if he found it OK. At about 9:13 I get a reply "Just finished parking." It took him another five minutes to walk from the parking garage to the building so he was about 20 minutes late. Hmmm. Luckily, it was not a big deal (he is unpaid afterall). He said they are very laid back and very accomodating. His first day was spent unfolding letters (bills) and placing them in other folders. He was a tad bored but he wasn't complaining - much.
After navigating the Mass Pike and Boston traffic he figured he really should find another option so we plotted his trip via the commuter rail system. The next day, he rode the train in to the Back Bay Station for a short walk to work. I got a call a few minutes after his train was due to arrive - "I'm not sure where I am". Great! I quickly pulled up Google maps and we figured out where he was and I got him going in the right direction. That day he did more unfolding and some transcribing. At the end of the day, they happened to get a shipment of old books from 1812 or something, written by a French speaking guy and they wondered how they would translate it. Kyle said "Um, I speak French." So the next day he was researching the information in these letters trying to figure out where this guy was and what he was doing. Based on Kyle's translation and research, he figured out that this guy was in the Dominican Replublic and logging the cargos of incoming ships from around the world. Pretty cool for his third day.
We still haven't gotten the stipend payment sorted out so I hope we actually see this money. I'm racking up the commuter rail bills so I sure hope this works. I think Kyle's actually going to see about $100 of this $4000 by the time all the expenses are accounted for.
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