Adapting to Change at Voice of America

By Dean’s Intern Amrutha Chatty at Voice of America

Getting to work with my morning coffee!

Interning at the Voice of America has been nothing short of a wonderful and enlightening experience.

My internship is in the PR department. There are four full-time workers and a few circulating interns who help out with a lot of work. While we were still in the office, a lot of my time would be spent preparing for giving the daily VOA Studio Tour. The tour was a great way for visitors to learn more about VOA and its mission. It was open to the public, but most often groups would book tours ahead of time. VOA broadcasts internationally, so most tour groups would come from out of the country and would have special interests in VOA’s operations in their specific region.

One of my most memorable tours was when the State Department brought a group from India. My parents are originally from India and they listened to VOA radio growing up. As the tour guide I was assisting talked at length about VOA’s services in India, I learned so much about the kinds of things my parents used to listen to and the current political and media landscape of that region.

Since we’ve moved online, I’ve started working on projects for VOA that are more focused on long-term help for them. I help write and edit content for social media, plan and sort pictures for the calendar, and help out with any other things that come up. While I definitely miss running around the office and getting to work in a historic building in downtown DC, I’m so grateful that I have been able to extend my experience with VOA through this crisis.

I have learned so much about working in a news organization as well as working in a government organization. The people at VOA are passionate, talented, and extremely smart and I know I’ll remember this experience for a very long time!