Intern Bonding

Jillian Barwick

The life of an intern can be extremely busy, crazy, hectic, messy, scattered, and, well, you get the point. This can leave said intern without time in the day to even think for his or herself, let alone make friends with fellow interns and co-workers. There are some cases where an intern may be the only summer intern in the entire office. Lucky for us interns at Pearson in Upper Saddle River, New Jersey, this is not the case.  We have a group of fifteen bubbly interns with ecstatic-to-work-mentalities to collaborate with on a daily basis.

Having so many people around you that share the same internship jitters makes working for such a big company more relaxing and fun. I have some friends who have intense summer internships for uptight companies who either have no time to make friends with other interns or are the only intern in their office, making it difficult to bond with people who work there year-round.  I even have a friend who ended up eating lunch alone for several weeks, reminiscent of Lindsay Lohan’s scene in “Mean Girls” where she eats lunch in a bathroom stall.

At Pearson, we have a great, established summer intern program, set up so that you will never have to fear eating your sandwich alone in the bathroom. Since there is a large group of us interns, we established an “intern thread” through our Pearson e-mail accounts. This thread is used for brainstorming and bouncing ideas off of each other, checking in with one another, and planning dates and times of lunch outings or dinner get-togethers.

Christie and her sippy cup

This past Thursday, we scheduled an intern dinner after work at Houlihan’s for some nice, relaxing quality time outside of the office. It was excellent!  Hanging out with fellow interns was a ton of fun. Conversation never stopped at our table of 15. With a large and rambunctious group, it is sometimes hard to get a word in, but we all took time to listen to everyone else. We all laughed when Christie was given a kiddy cup with a lid on it after she spilled her first drink almost immediately, and I really think the waiter enjoyed our large group, that is until we needed to split the check – oops! After the check was paid, the group gathered out front of the restaurant and documented our wondrous outing with a group photo!  

It is really spectacular that we all get along so well. Seeing the same people day in and day out for about eight weeks can be tough if you are not fond of each other. We are extremely lucky that our personalities have clicked and meshed so well together. It makes lunching together every day hilarious when we talk about random Harry Potter fun facts, Youtube videos, or current events.

No matter what the discussion happens to be, having a fun, energetic group of

The Upper Saddle River Interns at Houlihan's

interns means there will always be a great time when it’s spent together. From crazy lunch stories, to what’s happening in the news via “intern thread” or where our next outing will take place, we, as Pearson interns, are “Always Learning” new things about ourselves and each other.