Ga-Young So
Seoul, South Korea; Okemos High School, Okemos, Michigan; Transfer from University of Illinois
I have always had an interest in working at international organizations. When I was doing some research on ILR, I knew of some opportunities at the International Labor Organization (ILO). I also thought working at the ILO would be possible if I transferred to ILR. I discovered that you could apply to up to five organizations and all the organizations I applied to were at the ILO. I wanted to do international development studies.
As an international student studying in the states, I knew I was more research-oriented than doing field work. I have worked on macro policy issues—a macro policy coherence process which is about creating more jobs and better jobs at the same time. Together my supervisor at the ILO and I tried to prove that there is no point of creating jobs if the jobs created exploit people. My supervisor gave me an extension so I took an additional semester off to stay there longer.
I am interested in public policy and the ILO opportunity provided me with a chance to work in that area. My responsibilities were in finding statistics on macro variables of the world and then implementing them with a statistical package.
The pattern of my work was pretty much set. The only thing that I had to figure out was how to use the statistical package on my own but that was not hard to do. It was interesting work. I had a concentration in economics and I’ve taken statistics classes and in my work I could apply what I learned in the classroom.
My internship work was more than I expected. I was really satisfied. I enjoyed my stay in Geneva and I had the opportunity to meet a lot of people from all over the world. That was a plus.
My internship helped me to know what I want to do. I gained hands on experience of what I learned at ILR and it enhanced my self-confidence in what I can do. I found out what I enjoy doing and then what I can do well. In fact, I just received an email from my supervisor at the ILO who told me that I can go back there and work. The networking you can do at your internship can give you a good opportunity.
I am applying to graduate schools. I would like to get a master’s degree in public policy. After the credit internship, I knew that I want to be a researcher in the public policy area. So my ultimate goal is becoming a researcher at an international organization or a university.
