Week 10 Blog – John Rossow

My final week of my internship was a bit slow compared to previous weeks. I was surprised at how quickly the internship went by, which I like to see as a good sign. Since it was the last week of the internship, all interns were assigned an intern group where each group presented on a Business Resource Group that Aon represented. I was on a team that built a presentation and presented over Aon’s involvement in the Asian Pacific Islander Business Resource Group. We planned on doing our presentation on Wednesday. Majority of the week I was working on the group presentation as well as my individual presentation to my team I scheduled to do the next day, Thursday. I was focused on my individual presentation as that one is 20 minutes of the work I have been doing. In my presentation, I was able to identify upcoming projects and project owners, and highlight top project sectors, regions, and top project owners by construction valuation and revenue. I planned on giving my presentation in a hybrid style, some colleagues in person and some dialed in through Webex. I went into the office in Chicago and booked a conference room for my presentation, only to realize that my entire team was out of the office that day. Instead, I gave the presentation in an empty conference room completely on Webex. It was a very different style of presenting than I have ever done, but none-the less I was able to present my presentation on PowerPoint and Power BI very well, and I am proud of the work I put into the presentation, and how the presentation went. I am very pleased with how this internship went this summer, I look forward to my upcoming career and I plan to keep in touch with as many people as I can along the way.

Week 10 – Emily Rick

With only two weeks left of the internship, I have only one major project left. My manager mentioned it earlier as an opportunity for a stretch project proposed by the VP of Marketing for North America. At the end of the month there will be a conference for the sales and leadership teams. I have been tasked to write and present a report on economic and consumer trends relating to the recession with projections for the next 6 months to be used by the sales and leadership teams. I began research for my presentation this week which included watching last year’s conference recording. I discovered that the CEO of Kerry North America will be presenting before me and over 200 people will be participating. I initially thought this was a prank. I could not be more honored or proud of myself for them giving me this opportunity though. Last year, they outsourced this project to a data technology company, so I was definitely intimidated at first when I started my research. My research is fortunately going better than expected, and my manager will be helping me more next week. I will be presenting an outline with my manager to the VP of Marketing at the beginning of next week and I could not be more excited. I am feeling extremely grateful and like my hard work is really paying off.

While I have two week left of my internship, some of the other interns ended early or left to go back to school this week since they start sooner. It was bittersweet saying goodbye to them. I feel extremely thankful that my fellow interns were so amazing. They were all incredibly kind and great to work with. I will definitely miss them, but I am hopeful we will stay in some contact.

It is weird knowing I have to move back to Michigan soon. I feel like I have finally gotten comfortable living in Beloit and living alone. I have a pretty good routine down and I have come to really love this town. I know it’s time to move on, but I anticipate it will be hard to leave. I have made so many cool connections with people and places here. It’s hard to say goodbye. I am hoping I can hit the rest of my Beloit bucket list in these last couple of days. My first week here I remember wanting to go home more than anything and being terrified I had made a mistake moving out here. Now I don’t want to leave. It’s crazy how time changes everything. Cheesy but true. I have grown so much in the past three months and had so many perspective changes. I didn’t know it three months ago, but I think this summer was exactly what I needed to progress not only professionally but also personally. I have zero regrets moving out here and it is one of the best risks I have taken in my life. As the queen Diane Hendricks did, I will invest back in Beloit when I become rich and famous. Until then, I am in debt to this Wisconsin town.

Week 9 in Beloit with Emily Rick

This past week has been one of the busiest yet. With only two weeks left in the internship, projects are wrapping up and we had our final presentations to the leadership teams. I am happy to report my presentation went amazing! My manager gave me great feedback and said she had multiple people ask if I would be staying on or applying for full time positions. That felt absolutely amazing. I have really pushed myself and worked a lot of long hours and hard days, and it all felt worth it this week. I was extended an offer from my manager and the VP of North America Marketing to stay on as an intern through my senior year. I could not be more grateful or proud of myself for this opportunity. Though after careful reflection of my commitments I have already made for this school year, I decided to turn it down. I had to be honest with myself and not overcommit and I think I made the right decision, although very hard to make.

On a fun note this week, to celebrate our presentations the marketing team took a trip to the Wisconsin state fair in Milwaukee. I was in a group with the VP of Marketing, heads of the the digital and communications teams, and another intern. I was a bit intimated at first but had an awesome time. I have been blown away at how personable and welcoming all of the leadership team has been at Kerry. At the fair, we were tasked with identifying food trends and got to taste tons of free food to make our discoveries. We also played games and did bumper cars. My favorite part was definitely the food. The bacon wrapped tator tots and fried Reece’s were my favorite.

After the state fair on Wednesday, we boarded the bus and came back to the office. I had an awesome opportunity to meet with another intern that is in the same agriculture professional sorority, Sigma Alpha, at another school. I had mentioned I was a sister in my presentation and she reached out to me. We grabbed coffee and connected when we got back from the fair. It was really cool to have this connection and meet her.

Overall, a long and awesome week!

Week 11 at the Aluminum Association

My last week at the Aluminum Association was a wonderful capstone to my time in DC. The week started off slow, and to be productive, I decided to return to my union database project  to add some valuable features. First, I filled in the excel with equations that would total facilities’ employees and divide union employees by total employment to get percent of unionized facilities for every company and the sector as a whole. I also created a table that organized union employees and facilities by congressional district. This will allow the association to apply my union data to their advocacy efforts by taking congressional union data to a representative from that district.

My supervisor also assigned me a capstone project based on my interests. He had me research the policy concerns regarding glyphosate and impacts on agriculture, health, and the environment. I found that glyphosate has minimal impacts to human health, with its status as a carcinogen being debated but the largest consensus being it’s not a carcinogen. For agriculture, I determined that glyphosate as significantly increased yields and lowered food costs and total pesticide use. Finally, for the environment, I found some positives such as glyphosate being less toxic and being used in lower doses than other pesticides and it breaking down in the environment,  but it also has shown some impact on bee populations’ immune systems. Overall, I recommended that the EPA do further research into if it’s a carcinogen and to extend education and extension efforts towards reducing pesticide drift and using mechanical, cultural, or biological methods of dealing with weeds.

I ended my internship with having lunch and meeting with my supervisors to give mutual feedback. My supervisors were very impressed with my performance, the speed and quality of my accomplishments, and going above and beyond in my work. They said they would be happy to recommend me for any job in the future. Overall, I loved my internship at the association. While I believe I will continue into a career of agriculture advocacy and policy, this internship developed skills of research, writing, and analysis that I can take anywhere. I have become an aluminum advocate for life. 

Week 10- Patrick Balow with BASF

 Though I have not had work since my last blog post that does not mean that I do not have anything to talk about in this blog post. I have been blessed with receiving an offer into the full time Professional Development Program (PDP) after graduation. This is awesome news as I am now able to go into senior year with a job offer lined up! I have since changed some of the courses I will be taking as I finish out my degree. One class that I added is about global food industries and markets. This class will be allowing to make some connections of what I have learned in my internship about assessing a global pharma industry and make those connection in a global food market. I was able to see how a global company made strategic decisions and now I will be able to learn about the different ways of going through out a strategic plan in a global food market. I have also created a schedule that will ensure that I will be graduating on time as that is a stipulation of going into the full-time position. I am beyond excited about the opportunities I will have after graduation and very excited about looking forward to the future! The program will give me a chance to explore many parts of the business to set me up in a position to make critical discissions in a management role. I would love to be in a management position. This program will allow me to expand my cross functional knowledge of the business. One opertunity I am looking forward to is building a cross functional knowledge of the food industry. I should get a chance to work with agriculture, human nutrition, and potential other global business units (GBU) that are a supplier to the food industry.

Week 11 – Emilio Cuellar HSC

This week has all been about preparing my final Grassroots Solar Philanthropy internship presentation to the board in charge of overseeing my time at HSC as well as the Corporate Giving Team who I was pitching the community outreach program I developed over the internship. Monday and Tuesday I spent working on developing my slides more and practicing going through my presentation in a board room. Come Wednesday, before I would give my presentation to a panel of employees consisting of higher management and C-Suite executive level positions, I worked on simplifying my presentation more which in turn helped me give the presentation in a much calmer and more concise fashion.

The presentation ended up going much better than anticipated as everyone had a lot of feedback to give. The Corporate Giving Team was really satisfied with the direction I took the community outreach program and they gave me a couple of follow-up tasks that were focused on writing up what I think HSC should make with the program, in terms of keeping it running and growing it in the future. The CFO got me to set up a meeting with the company’s head financial officers in order to go over my ideas for capturing the commercial solar investment financial incentives the government gives out. These extra tasks resulted in the company extending my internship for another week in order to get all the work wrapped up. The results from my presentation can hopefully attest to the belief I have that I exceeded the expectations of my employers.

Week 10 EuroChem North America

It is amazing that I am reaching my last week at EuroChem already, where has the time gone. For this upcoming week I do not have much responsibilities left. My project is done, the only task I have left is to finish a power point presentation which serves the purpose of instructing new interns and employees to the world of the fertilizer business. It has been very educative the time that I have spent in here. I have not only learned about business but also about life, choices, values and much more. I definitively feel that I am returning a different person to Panama than when I first came here, I do not know how this will change or affect m life, I guess I will have to go back to find out, but I definitively feel different, with a different outlook, maybe not now but I feel than when I go back this experience will give me much more confidence in the office environment and in life in general.

I have no words to thank all my piers and coworkers that I have met here for all that they have done for me, I hope that my time there helped them as well as they helped me. Even though a part of me is sad that this experience is coming to an end I look forward to whatever life throws at me next, I am confident that now I am much more prepared to face it than before coming here.

Week 9 Blog – John Rossow

This week started off as a typical week at Aon. I began with reviewing our intern presentation on PowerPoint and starting to get some things put together for our presentation next week. One of the big things that is happening this week is a colleague, Chris Greene, from Canada is coming in for one of my fellow intern’s final presentations as she is leaving a week early due to college volleyball. I went into the office on Wednesday and Thursday this week to see Chris Greene and team, but also to be there for my fellow intern’s final presentation. It was good for me to see her give her presentation first as we have worked together on our presentations, but it also made me feel more comfortable when I give my presentation next week. I was originally kind of nervous as I was not sure how the format would be due to the presentation being a hybrid presentation through Webex, but in a conference room within the Aon Center. Having my fellow intern do this before me, and being able to see it, I was able to calm myself a bit now that I knew how the presentation would go. Additionally, I was gauging the questions that were asked to her, so when the most likely similar questions come my way after my presentation, I will be prepared for them and have well thought out answers. I also had a conversation with my supervisors this week talking about next steps after my time at Aon is done. They lined me up to talk to brokers at Aon to gauge my interest in Brokerage Operations. I have an interview with a colleague at Aon later this week with another pending. I look forward to seeing what they have to say and what they do daily.

Week 9 EuroChem North America

This week being my second to last week has made it a very reflective time for me. Now that my time to leave is already here I can look back and appreciate how much I have been able to learn during the short time that I was here. It was truly humbling being in the presence and working in an enterprise this big and influential over the world. For me the biggest lesson that I take from my internship at EuroChem is that what makes a job or experience great is not only what you accomplish and the goals you set to yourself, but also the people that surround you during this time. Having money and luxuries is great but if you do not share them with the right people you will be miserable and its now worth it so sell your life for cash.

It is a weird lesson to take home but one that I value a lot. Most of the lessons that I learned during this time I learned them outside the office, either in a meeting with business partners or alone in my room when I reflected about my day and my time in here. Certainly this was not an easy time for me, but I am grateful for this difficulty, I am grateful that it was not easy and put me to the test in certain areas were I am certainly better today thanks to this experience, I have nothing to say but thank you.

Week 10 at the Aluminum Association

As I approach closer and closer to the end of my time at the Aluminum Association, I continue to wrap up smaller projects. The main assignment for this week was creating a summary of greenhouse gas emissions by the major North American aluminum producers. I was tasked with looking for greenhouse gas intensity, which is the tons of greenhouse gases per ton of product. To find this information, I looked through each company’s sustainability reports to look for information on greenhouse gas intensity for each category of aluminum product as well as for scope one (direct), two (energy consumption), and three (upstream and downstream in the supply chain) emissions. For each company I found varying amounts of information but I was able to find a break down for at least scope one and two emission intensities for all companies. Knowing this information will allow our sustainability department to make better projections of the industry’s carbon footprint as well as steps to decarbonize the sector. It is also useful in our advocacy work and it will pair nicely with the work I did earlier this summer with the calculating the U.S. aluminum industry’s energy use in btu of oil and kilowatts.

Last weekend, I also completed a research paper I did for the association in conjunction with our AFRE 493 class. My topic was on the impact of carbon border adjustments (CBA) on the aluminum industry. CBAs are a border mechanism that applies to an import and adds a tariff to them if they have a higher carbon footprint than a similar domestically produced good. I reviewed two current proposals for CBAs: the European Union’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) and the U.S.’s Clean Competition Act, which is currently just a bill not yet introduced into committee. CBAM would base its value on an established carbon market that fluctuates based on a cap and trade system, while the Clean Competition Act would set a carbon tax at $54 per ton, with it increasing at 5% above inflation each year. Both CBAs would measure an imports’ carbon emissions through scope one and two, but not scope three emissions; however, the EU is currently debating about adding scope three in the future. Through my research I found that U.S. aluminum has an average amount of scope one and two emissions when compared to other countries, but it has the lowest scope one, two, and three emissions combined out of any other country. That means that if the U.S. exports aluminum to countries with CBAs, such as the EU, they would pay no tariff if scope three emissions are taken into account, but would have to pay a tariff if only scope one and two emissions are used. Additionally, if the U.S. has a CBA, all other countries would have to pay a tariff if measures emissions by including scope three. This discrepancy is explained because the U.S. produces more secondary aluminum (recycled scrap) than primary aluminum, and secondary aluminum uses much less emissions and energy, reducing its carbon intensity. Therefore, the U.S. aluminum sector benefits in CBAs that include scope three emissions that determine the carbon intensity of a product throughout its entire lifespan, including when it gets recycled. The paper was extremely interesting to write, as CBAs are a new tool to combat climate change and carbon leakage into other countries with less regulation. In the future, I would be interested in learning about how CBAs would impact agricultural imports and exports.

Next week is my last week, so I will be finishing a few loose ends from other projects. These include including company total employment and percent of company employment that is unionzed to my union database project, linking the number of union members to each congressional district, reading about the Inflation Reduction Act and how it relates to aluminum, writing thank you cards to my co-workers and those I have networked with this summer, and writing a letter to the future intern giving them advice. While I am sad to begin wrapping up, I am excited to put a bow on all of my efforts and to return home.