A Day in the Life of a Gladney Intern

I started interning as a volunteer with the Colombian Adoption department, which was an amazing experience. I switched to The Birth Parent Services Department in the Fall 2013 semester for some more client interaction and hands-on experience. Working in the Birth Parent Services Department, there is literally never a dull moment! Another great privilege of interning for multiple semesters was I got to shadow a case with a birth mom named Julie* from the very beginning all the way to post placement. Contact with birth mothers can often end abruptly if birth moms come to Gladney late in their pregnancy, cut off contact with us immediately after they relinquish their parental rights, or sometimes just don't keep us in the loop. With Julie's case, I was there from the initial meeting all the way to her placement. I shadowed Julie's weekly meetings and even led a few myself :) Julie lived in Gladney's Guest House, so I frequently transported her to various appointments

Oh, how my time at Gladney has been sweet! As an intern in Marketing, I didn’t really know what to expect. I knew of Gladney’s wonderful reputation and of their high standards and values, but was unsure of what the day to day operations of the office would look like. My internship at Gladney has afforded more learning opportunities than I could have ever expected. Everything that Gladney does in the internship program is focused on you getting out of the internship what you want. Each morning I arrived eager to start the day! I have spent most of my time with my co-workers in Marketing, making AP profiles online and helping out with social media campaigns. I am grateful for the loving and encouraging environment for which I get to walk in to each day. Some mornings I attended meetings: legal, international, development- whatever interested me I was encouraged to attend! The whole experience was geared towards me getting what I wanted out of the experience. The whole Gladney staff

A couple weeks ago, I attended the Pathways training that is required for all international adoptions. It was outstanding! Sitting in the room with all the families, I could feel the love radiating. It was beyond measure. Mothers crying, telling about the child they had been matched with and how they had been praying for their child for so long. Several families had children in the same orphanage. They chatted, cried, and bonded over the struggle of patience, excitement and fear. "He called a little child to him, and placed the child among them. And he said: 'Truly I tell you, unless you change and become like little children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Therefore, whoever takes the lowly position of this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven. Any whoever welcomes one such child in my name welcomes me.'" -- Matthew 18:2-5 Beyond the love, came the reality. I cannot begin to explain how eye-opening the conversations were and how very lit