My internship with the Las Vegas Natural History Museum has taught me crucial information about both research and career building as well as what I want and don’t want personally in my future endeavors. Firstly, this has definitely benefited my future career as a researcher as they allowed me to learn research first-hand, such as creating and collecting data from surveys given out to the membership. Although it greatly differs from my major of study, given that the research I’ve done with the museum has not been literature based like History is, I’d still argue that the data based research I’ve learned with the LVNHM is equally important for future careers. It has nothing to do with history, but plenty of organizations need people who can do data AND literature based research. However, although I was lucky to have already taken a statistics class before this internship, I do believe that an internship like this one would require at least an introduction to statistics in order to understand basic statistical data analysis. However, from my understanding, new research interns with the Las Vegas Natural History Museum will be shifting towards more archival work and dealing with exhibits and artifacts, so perhaps some anthropology would be more beneficial for future LVNHM interns.
However, the work I did for them, while not exactly what I want to do in the future, helps me to realize there are plenty of career opportunities in the field of “research.” I do not have to be a scientist or statistician to do research outside what I am used to from my work with historical research. Perhaps I will find a career that combines both my love for history and historical research as well as practical, data based research. If I wish to pursue a full-time position in a field, I think the main thing I would need would be more experience interacting with people, whether over the phone or by email for the sake of getting people to participate in research. However, my main piece of advice to new interns is to be willing to try something new and actively talk to your supervisor about exploring all the opportunities your organization may have. I, unfortunately, did not do this, so most of my experience is reflected by the accompanying image: sitting at a desk, doing research.
