My name is Aly Warenski, and I am currently majoring in Strategic and Corporate Communication and minoring in Leadership at Chapman University. I interned at Sports Media during the spring semester of 2024. Sports Media is a sports marketing agency that provides services and products to advertisers. The position I held at the company was a social media marketing intern, where I created social media posts advocating for name, image, and likeness in college sports.

Facebook Post Created by Aly

It was very convenient how I found this internship. My older sister is a senior at Chapman, and she is also a Strategic and Corporate Communication major and Leadership minor. My sister interned for Sports Media last year and loved it. Therefore, I decided to apply to intern at Sports Media as well. The application was very quick and easy, and I heard back from the company within three days, informing me that I was selected as an intern. The manager did a very good job introducing me to the company. He provided me with videos and documents that explained my roles and responsibilities. I was able to create content within a week of being hired.

As an intern at Sports Media, I was responsible for using artificial intelligence to generate images, which I would create captions for, and eventually post on the Sports Media Facebook account. I was expected to track my social media posts to ensure they were receiving many likes and comments. I would attend weekly meetings to share my progress and provide my manager and coworkers with updates.

I am very thankful to have had some marketing experience from my previous Communication classes. I was in Introduction to Strategic and Corporate Communication (SCC 100) last year. In the class, we had a group project where we found a company we were interested in and created a campaign for them. My group chose Build-A-Bear. We came up with slogans and images to persuade our audience to shop at Build-A-Bear. I was able to apply this knowledge on message design to create social media posts at Sports Media.

AI created image

I learned many valuable skills and lessons through my internship at Sports Media. I learned how to effectively navigate and utilize artificial intelligence platforms and software such as Hello Woofey and Only Social. I became proficient in brainstorming creative captions to accompany my generated images. Finally, I was able to network and connect on LinkedIn with fellow interns and companies associated with Sports Media. These skills and experiences will serve me well in classes and careers to come.