My summer internship at EF Academy

International high school student Lily Anderen completed a two-week summer internship with EF Academy. Read about her experience working with sales and marketing in her own words:

During the summer before my senior year of high school, I applied to an internship at EF Academy in Zurich. I wanted to apply for a summer internship because I wanted to get an idea of how the real world works within business. I have always been conflicted on what I want to study and work with after high school, and I thought that taking the initiative to apply for internships would help me understand what I enjoy. EF Academy appealed to me because of their internationally diverse environment and international operations. EF Academy works to encourage learning abroad, something that I have grown up with and think that every student should get the opportunity to do.

Due to the Covid-19 outbreak, the internship unfortunately had to be done online. Although this wasn’t ideal, the EF team had put great effort into organizing an internship that I could do from home. Even in the midst of a stressful time for them, they were still able to offer me this opportunity. I received a two-week schedule of tasks to complete every day. The tasks were a range of different assignments, all from writing articles to designing website layouts. I had first thought that it would be difficult to keep up with a workload sitting at home all day, but I was really engaged in my tasks because I found them so relevant. I felt like I was doing something useful to them, rather than being a burden.

One of the key learning points for me was seeing how EF Academy and their employees were able to navigate the special circumstances with the Covid-19 pandemic. It was incredibly inspiring to see how they were able to consider the current situation and assess how they could work around it. Especially as a company who predominantly works with students travelling abroad, they were really challenged to explore their alternatives. I learned a lot about what it means to be adaptive as a company, and how businesses are impacted by global phenomenons. It illustrates “cause and effect” and causation perfectly, which puts what I have learned about in school into real life context.

The work that I did was within sales and marketing, two areas that I am interested in working with in the future. When doing my tasks, I was challenged to put myself in the target audience’s shoes. I had to think from a perspective that isn’t my own, and base evaluations on my past experiences and research. This was a huge stepping stone for me, as it made me understand the real world better. I now better understand the complexity and nuance in creating something that is appealing to a multifaceted audience.

Being an intern at EF Academy in Zurich was an enriching experience. It challenged me in a lot of ways, and ultimately taught me so much more than I would’ve first thought. Not only did I gain knowledge about the business world, but I also enhanced my critical and creative thinking skills. I have grown in just two weeks and I will be forever grateful for this experience.

EF Academy International Boarding Schools opens a world of opportunities for high school students by providing them with a superior education abroad, thorough preparation for university and a future that knows no borders.