News Story

Senior Matthew Stefanski now has a White House experience on his resume, thanks to his internship spring semester at the Office of the Vice President in Washington, D.C.

Stefanski worked as a correspondent in the office, sorting and responding to constituent mail, and he met Vice President Joe Biden.

“It was an honor to work in an office that is so highly valued by the vice president,” Stefanski said of the internship. “He calls correspondence the gateway to democracy.”

Stefanski is an IU Media Scholar and Media School Ambassador, as well a member of the IU chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists. He also has worked as a reporter for the Indiana Daily Student.

These activities, accompanied by journalism education, helped prepare Stefanski for his White House position, he said.

“I was responding to mail, so I needed to be a good writer,” he said. “Whether it was in journalism classes or at the IDS, IU set a good foundation for writing that I wouldn’t have been able to do this job without.”

Internships are necessary for students pursuing journalism, he said, because they allow students to accumulate a wide variety of experiences and experiment with the application of different skills. They also provide some important life lessons.

“The White House taught me the importance of a strong work ethic,” Stefanski said. “I was surrounded by people who work non-stop because they are devoted to the constituency and want to, not because they have to.”

Journalism career services director Marci Debnam agreed that internships are vital to students’ professional success.

“Internships are a crucial aspect of students’ educations,” she said.  “Without the real world component that, ideally, multiple internships provide, students are likely to be at a disadvantage when it comes to skills, knowledge and the ‘competitive edge.’”

Stefanski plans to continue to work in politics after graduation, but is undecided what side of the desk he will work. He is attracted to the idea of holding political officials accountable as a journalist, but also enjoys crafting messages and fostering communication between officials and constituents.

For now, his affinity is toward newspaper reporting. He is spending this summer as a correspondent for the Times of Northwest Indiana. In the past, he has interned at the News-Dispatch (Michigan City, Indiana) and The (Bloomington, Indiana) Herald-Times.

“I can never get away from journalism,” he said. “My first week back from D.C., I started working at a newspaper.”