My friend and colleague Sara Long, works at Michigan State University works in animal welfare/animal agriculture initiative communications at Michigan State. She sent me this email about this Cinderella story about finding her summer intern, Celeste Laurent on Twitter! Celeste Laurent is a student at Western Kentucky University pursuing a double major in Animal Science and News Editorial Journalism.
After responding to a tweet that read, “Searching for paid summer internship/job related to #farm, #agriculture, #journalism, #news-writing. Any suggestions welcome!” Long had found her intern in Laurent. A few emails and phone calls later, this student had found her dream internship. Laurent blogged about her experience on Twitter at her site, Celeste Laurent: From My Side of the Tracks. I think this is a great example of how social networking tools can help launch a career. I also think Celeste’s blog is an excellent way to market credentials. At her blog, she has included a portfolio with work samples, her resume and finally, her writing skills in the blog entries. Congrats, Celeste, and thanks for sharing, Sara! Follow their tweets, @rosamyst and @celestelaurent.
Honestly, I hated twitter for the first week I had an account. I literally forced myself to “tweet,” hoping that I would come to like the set up. As I’m sure you’ve noticed, I am a wordy person. Twitter’s 140 character limit took some getting used to but I’ve adjusted.
I quickly fell in love with tweeting when I discovered WeFollow. This site is basically a phonebook for twitter. It lets you register under the “tags” that you feel best identify with your twitter usage and browse other users who share your interests. WeFollow helped me find agriculture news sites from across the country and I began following them and replying to their tweets. Before I knew it, I had people from all over the agriculture world following me, replying to my tweets, and reading my blog.
That’s when inspiration struck. I needed an internship for the summer, why not see if anyone on twitter knows of any available?