As our team at the NC State Office for Faculty Excellence started to brainstorm ways to bring you asynchronous professional development content this summer, we found the book My What If Year, by Alisha Fernandez Miranda. We were inspired by her journey and her attitude: Embracing the Spirit of the Intern seemed a refreshing perspective to rediscover academic roles.
We want to take a moment to let you know what you can expect from this series, and to touch on a couple of issues that are very important to us – more so because we have a lot of participants from other institutions beyond NC State, including Alisha Fernandez Miranda herself!
What Will Come Your Way
This is what we will deliver to you: Every Wednesday during the month of July you will receive a media package by email as well as on our webpage. Each package will cover one of the topics that we have explored this year: Research, Leadership, Service, and Teaching. In the package you will find a link to a podcast featuring our guest for the week, a transcript of the podcast, a printable watercolor featuring a relevant building on the NC State campus, and an article where one of our hosts explores the subject of the week from the perspective of an intern, complete with main lessons or takeaways from our visit.
How You Can Engage with the Content
You get to decide how you want to engage with our content. Perhaps you prefer to listen to the podcast first, then take a look at our written materials. If you would rather read than listen, you might enjoy perusing the transcript. If you want to engage with other participants, we will be on Twitter and LinkedIn using #NCStateWhatIf and we would love to hear from you. If you know of a colleague who might be interested in a particular topic, or you want to have a local discussion group, please share!
We want you to know that when we chose our guests for this series, we tried to find the most engaging and inspirational people in every field. We were humbled by their willingness to welcome us into their offices and workspaces and generously give us their time and attention as we gathered the information that we will be sharing with you. As you will see, they are each experts in their field and respected academics, and there was much to learn from their experiences. However, we don’t want to present them to you as unattainable ideas of perfection. If you take anything away from this series, we want it to be how human our guests are, and how each one of them has succeeded in their own way, highlighting their own uniqueness.
Featured Student Artists
We hope that you will enjoy the watercolor illustrations that accompany each media package. The artist is Olivia Allen, a freshman Architecture student with a very unique style and perspective that really embraces the spirit of an intern. We are excited to show you the NC State campus through her eyes. If you have visited NC State before, we know you will recognize these iconic sights, and if you have never been here, this is our chance to show you around.
The intro music for our podcasts is also connected to NC State. The title is Peachtree, composed and performed by Jopsy Bayog, who graduated with a degree in Statistics in 2021.
Our Team
Finally, it is a pleasure to highlight the diversity of our hosts. Each media package features a different member of the NC State Office for Faculty Excellence, so you will get to experience their personalities as they bring their subject to you. We are grateful to every member of our team, and we hope that you will enjoy NC State’s The Summer of What If?