URI Junior Lands Internship to Manage a Target Store

Alex Turco plans to spend her summer interning at Target. |Photo by Grace Desanti

Junior textile marketing and public relations double major Alex Turco has an internship acting as a manager of a Target over the summer.

“I was looking at internships on my own and I didn’t really have much luck,” said Turco. “So, I went to the CCEE and they kind of helped me better my skills on how to look for them.”

Turco will be the executive management intern at a Target on Long Island for 10 weeks starting in June and ending in August.

This opportunity is very exciting for Turco because she loves the company itself and thinks the experience will be very rewarding. She is looking forward to learning how to run such a large store, make connections and network, get feedback on how she’s doing and be a leader.

“Internships are really important because they give you experiences and connections and networking and especially for business majors like myself, networking is the number one thing,” said Turco. “I really want to go into a management field, and this internship is [going to] be a great way to get my foot in the door.”

Turco has served as an orientation leader and tour guide at URI and has always enjoyed being in a leadership role. From her internship, she hopes to further develop her leadership skills.

“Everyone thinks of a leader in one sense but there’s so many ways that you can be a leader, and I think finding out how I lead and what’s effective for me is gonna be really eye-opening,” said Turco.

Another thing Turco is excited for is getting accustomed to a full-40 hour work week and retail experience. Being a student and manager at Carvel, she hasn’t worked full-time or in retail and is glad that when she graduates she’ll know what it’s like.

The CCEE offers resources to students to help them prepare for internships. Jenna Visinho, a career education specialist for Harrington School students, said that students can find a lot of their resources on their website, which is uri.edu/career.

“Pretty much every question that a student has, we have it laid out right there,” said Visinho.

Visinho explained that there are essentially three different ways to get an internship: using a job/internship board, looking up specific companies and finding out if they have an internship program or by creating an opportunity yourself.

The CCEE’s website has links to job boards and the staff in Roosevelt Hall is willing to help students with their presentation to potential employers.

“Once you find something you need to know how to apply,” said Visinho. “So we can work with students on fine tuning their resume and tailoring it to the positions, showing how to again tailor a cover letter. We can even prep you on interviewing skills.”

There are also career and internship fairs that are held throughout the year to give students a headstart in networking and talking to employers.

“Internships are important because you can no longer just have a degree,” said Visinho. “You need to have experience to make you a well-rounded individual.”

University of Rhode Island students looking for internships can utilize the CCEE in Roosevelt Hall for help. The CCEE is also free for URI students to use.