One of the downsides to having a remote working experience is that most of the time, you don’t get to see the faces of your supervisors or coworkers outside of some Zoom meetings. During this experience, I haven’t been able to see the faces or attire of any of my coworkers or supervisors outside of the photos of them on the organization’s website. I want to assume that higher-ups such as my supervisor and the CEO wear formal and casual business attire. As for me, I dress for my internship in my comfortable home clothes. Working remotely allows me to wear clothes that I normally wouldn’t wear at my part-time job or any other professional setting which I see as a positive since I don’t need to worry about “dressing to impress” outside of Zoom calls with higher-ups.

Another downside to working remotely is that you’re deprived of a classic working experience. Most of the time, you’re working in your own home and sitting at your own desk while you get work done. This is the case I find myself in with this internship as I primarily do most of my internship work at my home desk. I try to keep my desk as neat as I would if I were in an office cubicle. All of my working materials are kept to the side of my desk for easy access and my laptop is always in front of me since it’s what I do most of my design work on. I also keep a notepad handy so I can write down a list of things I need to do for the day. I do my best to stay on top of all of my work, be it school or my internship job.

Work hours is something that I’m still unsure of how it works. So far for this internship, I have logged down all of the hours I have spent working projects as time spent “working”. Since there is no clocking in or clocking like there is at my part-time job, I have to be responsible for keeping track of how many hours I spent working that week. At first, this was a little confusing to get used to since this internship is still my first job experience where I’m working remotely. However, I realized now that keeping track of how much time I spend working isn’t that hard. To keep track of how long I work, I set up a stopwatch on my phone whenever I start a new project and stop whenever I consider my work for that day finished. Typically, the work I do usually takes anywhere from 8-12 hours to complete. After I send it to my supervisor, I await their feedback and any extra work I spend fixing or redesigning aspects of the project, I count as “hours worked” and add that to the amount of hours I have already worked. As for meals, I usually count those alongside my working hours since I usually am eating lunch at my desk, browsing through my project and seeing what I’ve worked on so far and how I can improve it.

Applying as an intern with the organization was a smooth but nerve wracking process for me. During the beginning of the semester, I had been having trouble finding an internship with an organization and was beginning to feel anxious that I would fall behind my classmates due to needing to keep up with other classes and my part-time job at Target. Luckily, my professor understood my plight and recommended that I apply with a non-profit organization as it would free me up from needing to travel and perform tasks and projects on-site. Following her advice, I tidied up my resume and cover letter, sent them in an email to the CEO and received a reply within the next day for an interview. I was surprised with how fast the response and even more surprised with how fast the process from interview to receiving the job was.

During the interview, I was in a Zoom call with myself, the CEO, and another student from my internship class who was also pursuing an internship with the non-profit. In the call, we were both given a rundown on what department we would be working within and what types of tasks we would be performing. The CEO also made me make an account with a communications software called Rock. From Rock, I would be able to communicate one-on-one with the CEO, supervisors, and other interns working in the same department I was. At first, this was tough to get used to since I had never worked remotely before and this internship experience was the first time I had ever done remote work. However, I was able to learn how communication worked on Rock rather quickly and I was soon able to communicate with my supervisors and submit projects to them effectively and on time.

I am currently working in the Communications & Marketing Department with the title of Digital Design Associate. My current supervisor has the title of Director of Communications & Marketing. I am given projects by them on a weekly basis and am meant to complete these projects by the end of the week. So far, these projects have consisted of redesigning old organization materials such as their scholarship application and helping to design new ones such as articles and covers for their official magazine. I believe these projects are putting my graphic design skills to a proper test and the feedback I receive from my supervisor is helpful in that it helps me make work that best represents the organization.

For this semester, I am pursuing an internship with a public non-profit organization dedicated to assisting underserved local communities as well as helping immigrants engage in civic and economic life. Founded in 2016 by its CEO, the organization has upheld its mission of empowering these groups by advocating for social justice and civic engagement and providing them services in education, healthcare, financial support, and senior support. Ever since its inception, they have been working hard to assist these local communities and immigrants such as during the COVID-19 pandemic where on January 24th, 2020, they distributed over 1,000 masks and hand sanitizer bottles to the local Astoria community in Queens,NY. Across the COVID-19 pandemic, the organization continued to assist individuals and local communities hurt by the pandemic by helping more than 1,500 individuals in filing for unemployment, providing over 20,000 individuals with face masks, hot meals, and hand sanitizers, and assisting over 630 people in scheduling an appointment for a free COVID-19 vaccine.

Beyond the pandemic, they have awarded over $10,000 in scholarships to financially struggling students, completed over 4,500 hours of cleaning local community parks and gardens, and assisting more than 350 seniors in connecting them to a senior day care and obtaining home health aid.

 

The organization is a medium sized enterprise with 80 people currently working there including its CEO, the Chapter Presidents across various countries like Egypt and Morocco, and the Leadership. On top of that, there are other directors, supervisors and interns like me working across the organization’s various departments such as Human Resources, Community Relations, Strategic Engagement and Communications & Marketing. I am currently working in the Communications and Marketing Department where I work on various design projects for the organization that range from redesigning old material like scholarship applications to designing new material such as articles and covers for the official organization magazine. Along with these departments, the organization is also partnered with several organizations including the New York City Police and Fire Departments, Apple, the MTA, and the New York State Senate and NYC Council among many others.

 

After doing some further research into the organization through their website and social media, I found two articles that interviewed the CEO. In the first article titled, “TUC Features: Neil Trivedi is Impacting Lives Through His ‘Unity For Equality’ Non Profit Organization”, the interviewer asked the CEO questions involving the inception of the organization, its various international chapters, and even its membership program. I was surprised to learn more about the organization’s membership program through this article and the various benefits it granted to its members such as “tourism, entertainment discounts, yearly galas, job assistance and programs scholarship assistance.” I was surprised to learn this because I previously only believed that a membership acted similarly to a subscription service where every month, whatever amount of money you chose to donate would go toward the organization. I did not expect to learn that this membership came with benefits towards food, entertainment, and even job and scholarship assistance.

In the second article from WeEmpower Magazine by Tammy Reese, Tammy also interviews the CEO about the organization, asking questions pertaining to the work the organization does, how feedback from individuals affects the organization and what plans are for the organization going forward. From this article, I was surprised to learn that the two areas in which the organization was receiving the most feedback pertained to their pandemic yoga program and their services in delivering hot meals to senior citizens and groceries to financially struggling individuals. It was surprising to learn how not only did the organization provide food and masks for people struggling during the pandemic but also physical and mental stimulation and exercise through their yoga program. To me, this demonstrates that the organization doesn’t just care about bettering the lives of their target groups through offering money and support services but also cares about the individual by providing them programs like yoga that stimulate them and provide them with a means of mental and physical exercise.

 

Citations

 

• Nesmith, L., Wilkins, D., Austin, N., Magalit, J., Guidemann, M., & Khalid, E. (2022, July 15). TUC features: Neil Trivedi is impacting lives through his ‘unity for equality’ non profit organization. TUC. Retrieved October 17, 2022, from https://www.tucmag.net/features/interview-with-the-founder-of-unity-for-equality-a-non-profit-organization-changing-lives/ 
• About. Unity for Equality. (2022, October 14). Retrieved October 17, 2022, from https://unityforequality.org/ 
• Reese, T. (2021, August 14). Unity for Equality Founder and chairman, Neil Trivedi. The Empower. Retrieved October 17, 2022, from https://theweempower.com/2021/08/unity-for-equality-founder-and-chairman-neil-trivedi/ 

2a. After reading through the AIGA Design Guide as well as the PDF/New York TImes article of the Shepard Fairey “HOPE Poster” case, I believe that my approach to my own design work will change for the better. My reading of the AIGA Design Guides have provided me with a wealth of information on approaching copyright, utilizing photographs and illustrations from other artists and my responsibilities I have to clients, other designers, and the general public as a designer. Reading on the “HOPE Poster” case has provided me with an example on sourcing images and how tampering with images that I have not purchased a license to or asked permission for could not only damage me financially but also damage my reputability as an artist and designer. 
 

In the past, I can remember a few times outside of college assignments where I have posted another person’s creative work on my page. Most of the time, this was done on Instagram and done by reposting either a photograph of the artist’s work or the original post itself. If it was through a photo, I would tag the person who created the original work in my post and tell my followers to like and follow their artwork. While this can be seen as “unprofessional” by professional artists and designers, this was done through social media and I always made sure to properly credit the original artist. I was young (a teenager) and didn’t consider myself a professional at that point. These posts were always done with the express purpose of crediting the original artist who made the piece and getting more eyes on them by telling my own followers to go check out the original artist. In professional design assignments done for college, I often sourced my images from royalty-free image databases like Pexels. Websites like Pexels allow you to download and utilize free photographs without credit or needing to pay for a license. I often utilized photographs from this website when creating assignments that involved graphic design due to its ease of use and accessibility. 

Citation(s)

• “A Client’s Guide to Design: How to Get the Most Out of the Process” AIGA. (2001). PDF. New York City; Richard Grefé, AIGA. 
• “Case Study on Fair Use and Fair Dealing: The Hope Poster Litigation” Fisher, W. (2012). PDF. Cambridge; Harvard Journal of Law and Technology. 
• “Use of Photography” AIGA. (2001). PDF. New York City; Richard Grefé, AIGA. 
• Kennedy, R. (2012, September 7). Shepard Fairey is fined and sentenced to probation in ‘hope’ poster case. The New York Times. Retrieved October 8, 2022, from https://archive.nytimes.com/artsbeat.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/09/07/shephard-fairey-is-fined-and-sentenced-to-probation-in-hope-poster-case/ 

1a. Throughout my internship experience, I believe I have done my due responsibility as a designer and followed all ethical guidelines present in the AIGA guide for my projects. During each new project, I have always taken care in what images and designs I use in order to bring out an image that the organization was happy with. Being given resources by the organization such as their logo and branding colors meant that I would need to utilize these resources along with my own personal touches to produce works that aligned with the message of the organization. In AIGA’s “A Client’s Guide to Design: How to Get the Most Out of the Process”, they mention that the responsibility of a designer to their client is to “acquaint themself with a client’s business and design stan – dards and act in the client’s best interest within the limits of professional responsibility.”

In some of my first assignments, I had sent versions of my projects to my supervisors where the logo or branding colors went unused. After receiving feedback from my supervisor, I made changes accordingly in order to make sure that my work aligned with the vision of the organization. I have always kept the interests of the organization in mind and will continue to do so for every project I make for them.

This is done to prevent any lawsuits from occurring. As for image sourcing, for each project for the organization, I have sourced all photographs that I use from royalty-free image databases such as Pexels. Websites such as these contain royalty-free images that can be used in professional projects without credit. One such example from my internship experience was when I had to design 3 different magazine covers for the organization’s official magazine. For these 3 covers, the subject was Queen Elizabeth II and the cover was meant to be a tribute to her life after she was announced dead. For this project especially, I wanted to make sure that the images came from royalty-free databases. I only ended up making minor alterations to the photos in the end such as clipping the subject out of the background and color correction. Other than those alterations, all of the photos I sourced were royalty-free and free of copyright.

Citation(s)

• “A Client’s Guide to Design: How to Get the Most Out of the Process” AIGA. (2001). PDF. New York City; Richard Grefé, AIGA. 
• “Use of Photography” AIGA. (2001). PDF. New York City; Richard Grefé, AIGA. 
• “Guide to Copyright” AIGA. (2001). PDF. New York City; Richard Grefé, AIGA.