My name is Grace Parrish and I’m a sophomore at Central College in Pella, Iowa. I am participating in a week-long event called Career Kickstarter. This helps college sophomores learn about getting jobs, how to professionally network, and also have the opportunity to participate in a three-day micro-internship with companies in central Iowa. This experience helps students get a better understanding of the professional world and help build an idea of what they would like to go into after college.

For my micro-internship, I was given the opportunity to work with HIRTA’s nonprofit, Heart of Transit. Due to COVID-19, the internship was virtual and I was able to participate from Central. It has been an amazing past few days so I’d like to share what all I did.

Throughout my short time with Heart of Transit I was able to help in several different ways. I looked at the demographics from the Iowa census of the seven counties HIRTA serves and made a cheat sheet for them to use for quick access when pulling data. It was interesting to see the differences between the counties they serve.

I also gave suggestions on improving the website www.heartoftransit.com. I compared other nonprofit websites in the greater Des Moines area and made suggestions based on what I noticed on other websites.

Brainstorming different ways to increase donations to Heart of Transit was another task of mine. I brainstormed ideas about how to bring in donations and increase awareness of Heart of Transit. A lot of it was events and fundraisers that can be put on to bring in money towards the nonprofit, as well as ways to get involved in the community. The second task was to create social media posts to advertise Heart of Transit and ask for donations throughout the year.

Another opportunity I had was to ride on one of the buses for a morning pick up of a rider. I watched the driver interact with the rider and learned how someone in a wheelchair boards the bus. I have seen buses with the doors for the riders in wheelchairs, but was not sure how they rode the bus once they were on. The wheelchair gets secured in place with straps that attach from the floor to the bottom of the chair and gets tightened so it does not roll around. There is also a seat belt that attaches to the wall of the bus and the straps that stabilize the wheelchair. The driver showed me how to work the wheelchair lift and how to take care of the rider. I got a better understanding about how big of an impact they have on people and how well they take care of the people they serve.

There were also a few meetings that I observed. I met a variety of people and learned many different things when it comes to nonprofit work and how to plan a public transit route safely in the pandemic. I listened to a speaker talk about how to plan effective bus routes and how to improve abilities to provide the service. I also saw how HIRTA plans a ride, calls clients about their rides and how they take calls about scheduling a ride. This was all a great way to network and learn about different job opportunities available.

Throughout this experience, I learned so much and met great people along the way. The people that I worked with for my micro-internship were amazing and taught me more about myself by providing me the opportunity to work with them. It helped me figure out what kind of work that I may want to go into, along with the opportunity to help with supporting the nonprofit by sharing my ideas.