Friday at 2pm was my interview with Sacramento Metropolitan Air Quality Management District. Since I’ve never driven to Sac before, my bf offered to drive me there. So we left at about 1pm with my mapquested directions. We missed our exit, got off the freeway and went in the other direction on the freeway, and took our exit there. Well either mapquest was wrong, or we ended up on the other side of the road, because we could not find the next street we needed. We circled around for a while until we found some numbered roads. I needed 12th street, so we figured it shouldn’t be so hard to find. Well we found 11th, 13th, 15th, 17th, etc. As you caught on, hopefully, these were only odd streets. Well where were the evens? So we circled around some more, finally found a street name that was one of our streets from the mapquest, and followed it to another part of Sac. We eventually found more numbered streets, but these were in order, no skipping around, so we figured we were good. Kept driving looking for 12th street. Then, WOA there’s the white house! All of a sudden I got all excited, I had no idea it was right by the capitol! The last time I was at the capitol building was in 5th grade for a feild trip. Anyway, we kept driving found 12th street, and started looking for our building, building number 777 (yay I won the lotto, well maybe not). Well the numbers were too big, so we turned around and started going in the direction where the numbers were smaller. Bam straight ahead is the white house. So turns out some streets get cut in half by the white house. We had to find ways to get around the white house, which was hard cause of all the one way streets. Eventually we got around it and found the other side of 12th street. Then we parked and ran up the stairs to the 3rd floor. The interview itself was supposed to take 20-30 minutes he said, so Bo put about 45 mins on the meter. I looked at my watch and it said 1:58pm. Dang, just barely made it! Now, it’s supposed to take 25 minutes to get there, good thing we gave it extra time huh! So he was just finishing up with the person before me, and he brought me into the interview room. First he talked a lot about the company, how it’s divided, how things work, and then he descriped the internship position. This is a one year (about) internship, that averages 16 hours a week (meaning more in the summer and on breaks, and less during the school year, and perhaps not at all during finals and midterms). The intern will be doing thing such as calculating emissions and updating permits. The company monitors air quality in the Sac area so it has a buncha clients such as dry cleaners, chemical plants, etc. They have permits that have not been updated for many years, so this intern will be checking up on policies, updating databases, etc. Right up my alley, since I’m pretty organizational and can do that sort of stuff. This is much more my style of work than doing something in a lab. Then he asked typical interview questions, there were less than 10. They were things like why do you want this job, what courses have prepared you for it, some situational like what would you do in this situation, etc. I was nervous as crap of course, but I hope I answered them well, and didn’t stutter or whatever. I find that I trip over my tongue sometimes when I’m nervous, and try to talk too fast or something bad. I don’t remember if I did that there, I was feeling all dizzy and lightheaded, and he looked so far away haha. After all those questions were over, he said he’s willing to help give interview advice to interns because he was in our shoes once, and was not prepared for interviews. So he told me some details about how the interview process works, how the selection process works, what are some typical types of questions, what people are looking to hear, etc. He really went into details. I wished I had a taperecorder so I could remember everything he said. It was really helpful. I asked questions and he answered. I hope all that info stays in my mind for the future. He was really nice and really helpful. I’d ask a one sentence question and he’d give me an essay responce haha. He told me about why he selected me to be interviewed, also. At the career fair when we met, I asked a lot of specific questions about the company and the internship position. He remembered me after that. Then, out of all 26 or so resumes he got, I was the only person to email him a follow up and “thank you” email. So remember, always ask questions and follow up, that way people remember you. Then when I didn’t have any more questions and he didn’t have any more for me, we ended the interview and he walked me back out to the lobby so I could sign out. (I had to sign in before the interview started.) Bo was waiting for me where I left him, and said “WOW” to me. I wasn’t sure what that meant at first. When I went to sign out I glanced at the clock and the minute hand was on 35, so I went to write that I signed out at 2:35 and Bo said, “No, 3:35!” WOW is right. I was in there with him for over an hour and a half! I had no idea we talked for so long. That guy is really long winded. I felt kinda bad at first cause one, he said it was supposed to take about a half our when we scheduled it over the phone, and two, because he gets off work at 3:30pm, and I kept him past that. Well, then Bo said that if he wanted to stop the interview, he would have, instead he kept asking me if I had more questions and talked forever in reply, so I guess he was ok with it. At first I went in there thinking I can’t take the job, because I don’t know if I have time during the school year, and I’m stressed enough. But the more I thought about it and after the interview, now I realize I do want to take it. It would be an amazing opportunity for me, and to say I have 1 year’s experience when I graduate is just wonderful. Plus it’s so low-key since it’s a government job, they are very flexible and don’t expect things to be done yesterday like most public companies do. I’m very excited about it, and nervous too. He said he has a few more poeple to interview next week, so he won’t be able to make the final decision until probably the following Monday. The more I think about it, the more I hope he picks me. *crosses toes*

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