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Sami Dilisio

Department of Public Health: Georgia College and State University

KINS 4306 Internship Spring 2024

Dr. Ernie Kaninjing

April 12, 2024

Introduction: My name is Sami Dilisio, and I spent my spring semester as an

intern at Live Healthy Gwinnett, a Lawrenceville Georgia-based non-profit that began in

2014. Partnering with Eastside Medical Center and Gwinnett Parks and Rec, Live

Healthy promotes health and wellness through four pillars: Be Active, Eat Healthy, Get

Checked, and Be Positive. Live Healthy Gwinnett has a small staff of under 10

employees that work to make a large difference in the area through community

engagement and education on physical health and nutrition. The mission of Live Healthy

Gwinnett is to encourage healthy habits in community members such as eating healthy,

reducing stress, and increasing physical activity in hopes to better individual lifestyles

and reduce the risk of chronic illness in the area. The values of Live Healthy Gwinnet not

only include promotion of healthy living principals and encouragement of physical

activity, but they also value the development of community partnerships, and stress the

importance of bringing together diverse cultures and generations. Programs like Be

Active Gwinnett specifically targets under privilege communities that vary in race,

ethnicity, religion, and socioeconomic status; while the program Harvest Gwinnett

promotes healthy eating and gardening through plot rentals, community events, and

healthy cooking demonstrations across various gardens in the county.

Description of Experiences: As an intern at Live Healthy Gwinnett, no two days

of work were ever the same which was one of many aspects of the organization that I

loved! However, regardless of what event was planned for the day I knew I would be

promoting health in the community in some shape or form whether it be through physical

education at schools, resource fairs at community centers, play days at apartments, or

gardening at the parks. Due to my love of kids, my favorite part of the internship was
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working closely with one of Live Healthy Gwinnett’s programs, Be Active Gwinnett.

Although I did enjoy the learning experiences that came alone with their other program

Harvest Gwinnett, I would say my favorite memories from the internship involved

physical activity and health education with BAG. Specifically, I really enjoyed our

apartment visits and after school programs days where we would talk to children about

the importance health can have on your physical and mental wellbeing. After our small

lesson we would either let the kids have free play or encourage them to engage in group

games. I enjoyed these sessions especially because often Live Healthy Gwinnett will plan

these events for children in underserved areas where that child may be living in a play

dessert, an area that is unsafe for them to play in without constant supervision, or often

some of these families were unable to afford to place their child in sports that would

provide them regular physical activity. Due to these circumstances most of the kids

would get overjoyed when they see our van pull in because they know that they will get

to relax and have fun.

I would say the most challenging aspect of my internship experience was the

language barriers I encountered, however this also ended up being a great learning

experience for me. Oftentimes the areas we served were in Hispanic communities where

some children’s and parents solely spoke Spanish. This was a little nerve wrecking at first

because I wasn’t sure how I would be able to communicate with them and form

connections with the children. However, it turns out language barriers were not as big of

an issue as I originally thought, and I learned that there are different ways to

communicate with others rather than just talking. I found that body language and

translated flyers/posters really helped me communicate within these communities. If I

had to pick one thing that I wish I could've done more of it would be attended career

fairs, health fairs, and resource fairs because I found that these events were easy for me to

network at and make connections with other professionals involved in public health.

Perception and Evaluation of the Internship: I really had no expectations going

into this internship because I had never heard of Live Healthy Gwinnett prior to this

semester. I do think my internship exceeded any expectations I could have ever had not

only because I loved community work, but also because I truly enjoyed my time with all

the staff there. I have said this before in my journals, but each day I was excited to go to

my site because I knew I would be able to talk to some amazing people who made work

not feel like work. I am very thankful that I got the opportunity to work at this

organization, especially because I was able to meet Gaby, my supervisor, who was

amazing at guiding me through my internship experience. The organization was not only

open to ideas and my contributions, but they actively encouraged me to think of any ways

to improve the company or ways to promote health in the community. I am very fortunate

that I was able to work alongside people who I felt comfortable enough around to ask any

questions I had without hesitation.

I think the only way my experience at Live Healthy Gwinnett could have been

improved would be if there were any way that my internship would lead to full time

employment. However, Live Healthy Gwinnett is a small government nonprofit that only

consists of four full time staff members, none of which are leaving anytime soon. This

internship has given me many networking opportunities with other nonprofits that I

would not have had otherwise. I would recommend this type of work, and even this

specific organization to any future Public Health interns. I have even recommended this
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specific internship site to a few of my friends at GCSU who will be taking this course

next Spring which goes to show just how much I enjoyed my time here. Community

health work is very fulfilling and leaves you feeling like you are bettering people's lives

and I found that being out in the community really helped time fly because there was

always so much to do and so many people to meet. I would consider a career doing this

type of work whether that be community work, nonprofit work, or youth work because

those are all areas of interest that I am passionate about. I have even started applying to

various jobs that are like Live Healthy Gwinnett's program’s so hopefully in the future I

will get to do more of this type of work!

Internship Preparedness: I felt incredibly prepared for the internship experience

thanks to different opportunities I had in undergrad. To begin, my academic career gave

me a lot of insight on what working in the Public Health field would be like. Specifically,

courses like Senior Seminar and Community Health prepared me very well for internship.

In these courses I learned about what working with a diverse population would look

through tailoring messages to an audience and cultural competency which were very

useful during my role as a community health worker. During my time as an intern, I

worked with serval diverse populations whether it be in terms of age, gender, religion,

ethnicity, or socioeconomic status, so it was very important that I understood how to

deliver the overall message my organization was trying to convey. For example, older

generations seemed to have been the main audience for the gardening programs, so I

made sure to always have information flyers and posters ready to hand them oppose to

using social media to relay information, which is a tactic I would use when dealing with

younger generations. Similarly, cultural competency was used for various events by
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ensuring that some of our flyers were printed out in Spanish because we usually worked

in Hispanic areas.

Although there really wasn’t one aspect of my internship that I felt significantly

unprepared for, I do think I struggled most working with Harvest Gwinnett in the gardens

because my courses and prior experiences were never revolved around gardening.

However, I am glad I got experience working in the gardens because it challenged me to

learn new skills I would not have otherwise gained. All in all, I think that GCSU/ School

of Health and Human Performance did well at preparing students for real life application

of public health concepts. The only thing that I think could better improve students’

preparedness for a career in this field would be to incorporate more diverse courses or

lessons in the curriculum like nonprofit management or even a course on

gardening/sustainable living for anyone interested in work like what Harvest Gwinnett

does.

Internship Performance: I gained several new skills and experiences throughout

the course of my internship. For example, I went into this internship knowing virtually

nothing about gardening, however, through my work with Harvest Gwinnett I now know

names of different tools and crops, different harvesting techniques, and I got to learn

about the lives of some amazing community gardeners! Furthermore, my internship has

allowed me to further develop my public speaking and professional communication

skills. I had to attend many career fairs, resource fairs, health fairs, afterschool programs,

etc. All in which I was responsible for either leading a lesson or publicly speaking about

the work Live Healthy Gwinnett does. Overall, I was satisfied with my performance on

various assignments like our discussion posts and journals, as well as my main project of
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developing and implementing a health fair for the community that offered several free

health screening vendors for those in under privileged areas. I think that I was able to

efficiently manage my course work and the work at Live Healthy Gwinnett in a

successful manner by meeting deadlines and turning in quality work.

If I had to go back and give myself one critique it would be to start forming my

electronic portfolio and presentation months in advance, however I do think that I am on

top of both assignments as of right now! I think one skill that would be useful to improve

on after graduation would be setting a strict routine for myself. This semester I had a

pretty lose routine that would get thrown off a lot whether it be delaying when I ate,

staying up late, waking up at different times, etc., so I think adding in a routine will really

help me balance my professional and personal life to feel good, perform my best, and be

successful in the future.

Personal/Professional Insights/Benefits: Going into this internship I felt very

lost and even behind when comparing myself to my peers; it felt as though so many of

them knew what they wanted to do after graduation whether they had a job/internship

lined up, or they were planning to continue their education somewhere. Being a part of

Live Healthy Gwinnett has really helped eased my mind and clarify some things for me

regarding my future. I now know that I enjoy non-profit work as well as community

health because I enjoy getting to interact with different kinds of people. I also found

peace of mind by talking with staff and my supervisor through them sharing their career

journey with me. Some of my co-workers are in college and as young as 18, some of

them are married with a family, some of them ended up here when their original life plan

didn’t end up how they thought it would, but regardless everyone loves the work that they
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do. I found it very comforting to talk to everyone and I learned that nobody is 100%

certain where they will end up and that’s ok, it is normal for plans to change because

people are constantly changing.

Overall, this internship has led me to do a lot of personal growing, specifically, I

am now more confident in public speaking because I spent my semester talking to youth

about the importance of health and various health related topics. I also have improved o

my networking skills by speaking to other public health professionals that work closely

with Live Heathy Gwinnett. Furthermore, I have gained a lot of insight in the world of

community health and subtopics likes under privileged communities, minority health,

youth development, health education, environmental health and sustainable living, mental

health, and more! I love how this internship in community health has allowed me to gain

specific experience in these areas because I feel like I now have a diverse skill set and am

able to work with a variety of populations. Specifically, working with underprivileged

youth really opened my eyes to just how many people in my community need help and

are often overlooked. I have lived in Gwinnett practically my entire life, yet I had little to

no idea that so many people needed resources but lacked the knowledge on how to obtain

them. All in all, I am beyond thankful that I decided to do my internship with Live

Healthy Gwinnett because I gained so many valuable experiences in doing so. I began

this internship feeling uncertain and am leaving knowing that this was truly one of the

best opportunities I could have taken for myself.