Practicum Placement: Second Harvest Food Bank of East Tennessee
Song Lyric that sums up my practicum experience: I think a relevant tagline to sum up my practicum experience has to come from The Office because it is a crowd favorite in our Development team. Michael Scott said, “Sometimes I’ll start a sentence and I don’t even know where it’s going. I just hope I find it along the way.” I think this applies to the notion that people think that our events just happen out of thin air, and we figure it out as we go, but there are actually so many moving parts to keep this organization going.
The highlight of my experience at Second Harvest would have to be our staff meetings. I have never seen a room full of people doing such different things, but being so encouraging and supportive of each other. At the end of the day, every person in that building is there for the same purpose: to help our hungry neighbors throughout East Tennessee.
The capacity and reach of our organization has been the most surprising thing about my practicum experience. I was aware that Second Harvest serves 18 counties, but the fact that they have over 550 partner agencies that are working incredibly hard to get the food to the people who need it, is really something amazing to witness. There are so many moving parts to ensure that our neighbors are getting what they need, our seniors have access to food, and that our children are being fed nutritious meals, which are vital to their success.