My Internship with CBS – Part One

I have always been a fan of television and movies since I was a little girl.  Watching Saturday morning cartoons while my parents were preparing breakfast belonged to my childhood ritual.  Throughout my teenage years, I went to the movies with friends almost every weekend.  During the week, I kept up with my go-to soap operas before ending the day.  Back then it didn’t really occur to me to pursue a career in entertainment, it was more leisure for me after a long day of school, homework, and activities.

That changed though when I was about to transfer from Community College to California State University, Fullerton a couple years ago.  One of the assignments in my English Writing course required us students to write a compare and contrast essay, in which we were supposed to compare two potential transfer universities with each other.  I decided to look more into the Cal State schools in my surrounding neighborhoods and wrote about Long Beach and Fullerton.

Back then, I was still a Business Administration major and, therefore, looked into the specific programs this major had to offer.  One thing that caught my attention was the fact that Fullerton offered the concentration Entertainment and Tourism. Since I experienced the business studies so far as pretty dry, I had the impression that this concentration could put a fun twist on the profession.  But during the following semester I realized that this area was not supposed to be my path, and I changed my major to Communications with a concentration in Public Relations.

For a little while, I put the thought of working in entertainment to rest, solemnly focusing on getting good grades.  But my time to shine finally came during my last semester.  The last course I needed to be able to graduate was the Internship course.  Not exactly knowing which particular field of PR I desired to approach, I applied to several positions in different fields such as nonprofit, entertainment, tourism and fashion.  After applying for more than a month with not much success, I just prayed to get something just to be able to fulfill my graduation requirements.

Finally, in early December, I received a call from my school for an event planning internship with one of the university’s professors who was looking for a German-speaking intern. The informational interview went really well, and I was just happy to have an outlook for something.  The professor told me she would get back to me the next couple days after conducting additional interviews.

That same night, I received an email from CBS, which I had applied to a while ago and totally forgotten about it.  The email stated that I had been chosen for a phone interview.  Needless to say, I was majorly excited about the possible opportunity to land a position with one of the most successful networks in the United States.

The phone interview was scheduled for Thursday.  On Wednesday, I received an email from the lady that I interviewed with the day before, telling me that I got the job offer.  But in that moment, I didn’t want to settle with that just so that I had something.  I wanted to see if I could get my foot into the entertainment door, so I told her that I wouldn’t be able to commit until the end of the following week.  She understood, but made it clear that she wanted me on board.

The next day, I was a nervous wreck, highly anticipating the phone call from CBS.  At 11:30 in the morning, my phone rang, and I told myself to keep it together.  And I did.  In fact, after a short conversation during which I had to answer a couple of questions about my PR experiences and why I want to work in publicity, I was being invited to an actual in-house interview.  I was beyond enthusiastic, being one step closer to a possible internship with a renowned company.  But that is a story I will continue to tell next time…

Images: pixabay.com

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Anne-Kathrin Schulte, is a contributor for CaliforniaGermans.com. She writes on her personal experience of the American Dream as well as on working as an au pair in CA. She was born and grew up in Düsseldorf, Germany, where she completed her degree as a state-approved Kindergarten teacher. After her au pair engagement in the US and a quick return to Germany she decided to attend university in California and moved back to the United States. She has been living in Southern California since 2011.

If you would like to contact Anne-Kathrin, please send an email to californiagermans(at)gmail.com and place her name in the subject line.

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