Isabella Brilliant , '16

I did the winter accounting internship program with BDO, who is one of the top accounting firms outside of the big four. I worked there for ten months as a tax intern and it was a really good experience.

When you’re a tax intern you’re pretty much just thrown in since the Saint Joe’s curriculum does not give you a tax class before you do the internship. So it was definitely all new information, and it’s a lot of learning in a very short period of time. That’s just something to keep in mind, but again, you learn it just like you would learn a class and I learned more than I would ever learn in class.

The Career Development Center is very involved in the Accounting Department, so a speaker came into a lot of my classes and told us that BDO’s winter accounting internship was available, and said we should apply for it. Since I’m interested in tax, I thought it was really beneficial to my learning and to my experience personally to see how it is during a busy season. You hear a lot of things about tax like ‘oh you’re not going to have a life’ and ‘it’s overwhelming, you’re not going to be able to do it,’ but I thought I needed to experience it for myself, and it’s obviously doable since I’m sitting here, and I’m still an accounting major and I’m still doing it.

So I did the whole application process through Career Development; I applied and just followed the steps. I didn’t have any problems with the process, I think as long as you want to do it, it’s doable.

Don’t be lazy. I think a lot of people come to college because they think they have to, or because it’s just the next step in their journey. But you’re here to get a job, and there are so many resources that you just have to keep your eyes open to. I’ve had three internships and I think a lot of the reason for that is because I have always been very involved with my experience and known that this is my time to shine and get experience. These resources aren’t going to be here forever, and it’s never going to be as easy as it is right now.

Once you begin your internship, definitely listen. I’m one of those people who can talk for hours, and it’s way easier for me to talk then to listen, and that’s a fatal flaw of mine. But I’ve learned that you just need to stop talking and listen and soak it all up, because if you don’t you’re not going to get anywhere.