This summer, KID hosted Haley Thomas, an intern from the University of Chicago’s Summer Links Program. Summer Links is a 10-week summer internship program where students are hired by a community program or organization to work as a summer intern. The cohort is made up of students from a range of majors who are committed to public service, community building, and social change. Haley did tremendous work for KID and we had a wonderful time mentoring her. KID has had Summer Link Interns on and off for 20 years and they are always of great value to our mission.
Below is Haley’s experience at KID and what she learned these past 10 weeks:
Working with KID this summer has given me the opportunity to not only learn in depth about child safety issues, but also engage with and share the problems. In this position, I was able to work closely with so many different projects, and even lead them myself, in a manner I thought impossible for a new intern like myself.
Over the past few months, I mostly worked on two large projects: a report analyzing general consumer recall experiences, and a report taking a look at recall effectiveness from 2022 using reports submitted to CPSC called Corrective Action Plan (CAP) reports. Outside of those projects, I also updated KID’s social media and database with various product recalls, created various graphics for events, and wrote blogs on different topics. All of these projects and tasks have given me a firsthand view into the behind-the-scenes work at nonprofits, and equipped me with experience in research, data management and analysis, media design, and social media management.
I’ve learned more in this time than I could have imagined possible, and I am incredibly grateful for the experience and excited to continue working with KID in the future, and contributing to their mission of children product safety and advocacy.
We’d like to thank Haley for all her great work and look forward to her continuing her education in social justice. Want to learn more about what our interns and staff work on? Sign up for our newsletter to get updated monthly and follow us on social media @kidsindanger.
