Hi! My name is Gabrielle Aaron. I am a student at Washington University in St. Louis, not to be confused with Washington University in Washington—I promise this one is in Missouri. I am studying Psychology, Marketing and Children’s Studies. If you ask how they all go together, the answer is simply that these topics all interest me. Like my fellow second semester juniors at Wash. U., I am taking this semester in a different city in order to get a better understanding of the world; my away city just happens to be my home, New York.
This semester, I am a full-time student at New York University taking a variety of classes that caught my attention, but what I really wanted to get out of my time “abroad/away” was a better understanding of what life would be like after college. Although I am still taking classes, I spent a lot of my winter break looking for an internship that would challenge, inspire, and educate me. Most importantly I wanted an internship with a company I truly believed in. These searches lead me to non-profits, more specifically Generation Citizen. While at Wash. U. I took a class called “The American School,” which addressed the challenges of the education system and explored remedies to its failures. It is through this class that I was first drawn to Generation Citizen. When I heard about Generation Citizen’s goals, specifically teaching action civics, I knew these goals aligned with the goals of the class I had taken. I saw Generation Citizen as an opportunity to practice what I learned in school in the real world! This is something everyone always tells you to do, but then you argue that you will never have to use derivatives or imaginary numbers again after calculus. I knew I had to work with or for Generation Citizen; there was no argument there.
By the time I found the organization, the DC application had just passed, and I was told I could either apply for that position, or I could join the team in the office. I jumped at this opportunity! Getting to be behind the scenes and see how Generation Citizen accomplishes all that it does throughout New York, Boston, Rhode Island, and the Bay Area will be an incredible learning experience. Through this experience I hope to fully understand actions civics so I could incorporate it into my life. I didn’t have much of a civics education when I was younger, let alone action civics, and I’d like to use this as an occasion to develop my own citizenship and my sense of civic responsibility. I am eager to delve into this non-profit world and I cannot wait to share stories of all my experiences!
Generation Citizen is a nonpartisan, 501(c)3 tax exempt organization which does not endorse candidates; our goal is to engage our staff, participants, and stakeholders in political and civic action on issues that matter to them personally and in their communities. The opinions expressed in this blog post are those of the writer alone and do not reflect the opinions of Generation Citizen.