Caroline Maschke

Internship Site: Health Equity and Public Policy Intern with Voice Up Publishing Inc.
Hometown: South Jersey

Short Bio:
Hi everyone! My name is Caroline Maschke and I am SO excited to be an ambassador for the Cornerstone D.C. program! I am from south Jersey, about 30 minutes outside of Philly. Even though my parents will be moving down south soon, I’ll always be a Jersey girl at heart!

I chose to join Cornerstone D.C. because I wanted to make the most out of going to school in the nation’s capital, especially given the fact that I want to pursue medicine policy as my career. I knew that getting an internship my freshman year would help prepare me for future internships as I grow and advance at AU. Not only has Cornerstone already taught me valuable skills for my career and life, but it has also introduced me to some amazing mentors (shoutout Luke!) and some of my best friends. I truly believe that Cornerstone D.C. is the reason why I have had such a great freshman year; I would recommend to all incoming freshman that you join this amazing program!

I am interning at Voice Up this semester, which is a start-up focused on getting youth voices involved in health care. My position is a health equity and public policy intern, and I am excited to be creating a website with various cancer policies to educate others and help them start their own advocacy journeys with Congress.

Blog #1: February 10

Hi, everyone! My name is Caroline and I am so incredibly excited to be an ambassador for the Cornerstone D.C. program. I hope this blog can give you some insight into what life is like as an intern in D.C. and why you should join this amazing program! 

I am a public policy and health equity intern for Voice Up, a start-up which is focused on promoting youth voices in healthcare decisions. Since I am a biology major and also want to pursue medicine policy in my career, this internship is right up my alley! What is very exciting about this internship is that my supervisor lets us interns pick and design our own projects, allowing us to customize our experience so we are doing work we truly enjoy. After my father’s battle with rectal cancer, I became extremely passionate about cancer advocacy. This was what inspired my internship project at Voice Up. I designed and published a website where students can look through different cancer policies, then submit a form for me to request a specific policy from their members of Congress. The first few weeks of my internship involved a lot of policy analysis and research, as well as website design. However, now that I have a firm foundation for my site and my viewer numbers are increasing, most of my work is sending letters to members of Congress on the behalf of other students.  

When I joined Cornerstone, I was nervous about balancing my classes and my internship. Luckily, my first semester helped me learn time management as I applied to about 20 internships while taking classes; This made working my internship (which is about 10 hours per week) and doing schoolwork a lot easier of an adjustment. Some of my favorite classes this semester are General Chemistry 2 and Power, Discourse, and Pop Culture, which is a habit of mind. I am also taking the Cornerstone practicum, which meets once a week so that I can get credit for my internship. The practicum allows me to reflect on the lessons I have learned from my internship, allowing me to really grow as a working professional. 

I am a huge believer in having a work-life balance. I do not do any homework or internship work on the weekends so that I can truly enjoy campus life and the city! Last semester, I made it a point to go into the city each weekend so I could fully immerse myself in the culture and history of this beautiful city. This semester, I walked to the Washington National Cathedral with my roommate, which is about 30 minutes from campus. The cathedral is stunning, and I highly recommend you see it when you come to AU! My friends and I also went to Tysons Corner Mall to go shopping last weekend, which was a bit of a ride on the metro, but a lot of fun! I love using my metro pass, since it gets me almost anywhere in the city for free! 

Life on campus has been exciting as I get more involved in campus clubs and activities. I am playing for the club volleyball team this semester, which has been a great way to stay active, continue playing the sport I love, and make friends! I also started an on-campus club called Students Against Cancer, where we hold support groups and other events for students on our campus impacted by cancer. Our men’s basketball team has been doing really well recently, so I have gone to a few games to watch them play. I have definitely been busy balancing my extracurriculars with my classes and internship, but this semester is off to a great start! 

Thank you so much for reading my blog post: I hope that it has inspired you to join the Cornerstone program next year. If you have any questions, you can email me at cm0265a@american.edu. And while you’re at it, check out my internship project site by clicking here. I am so excited to keep you updated on how my internship and classes are going. Go birds!